Notes

In the notes below, the reference numbers denote page and line of the hardcover edition (the line count includes headings). Biblical quotations are keyed to the King James Version. Quotations from Shakespeare are keyed to The Riverside Shakespeare, ed. G. Blakemore Evans (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1974). For more detailed notes, references to other studies, and further biographical background than is provided in the Chronology, see the relevant volumes of the Northwestern-Newberry edition, Hershel Parker’s Herman Melville: A Biography, 1819–1851 and Herman Melville: A Biography, 1851–1891, 2 vols. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, 2002), and Parker’s Melville Biography: An Inside Narrative (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2012).

BATTLE-PIECES AND ASPECTS OF THE WAR

9.1 The Portent] John Brown and eighteen of his followers seized the federal armory at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia), on October 16, 1859, with the purpose of arming slaves and starting an insurrection. He was captured on October 18, convicted of treason, and hanged on December 2, 1859.

9.10 hidden in the cap] A white muslin cap was over John Brown’s head as he was hanged, his thick long beard sticking out below it.

10.1 The Conflict of Convictions] In the text of Battle-Pieces, superscript lowercase letters refer to Melville’s own notes, which are printed on pp. 134–42 of this volume.

10.4 the long recall] A specific bugle call, like the “Boots and saddles” call mentioned later (see note 116.34).

11.15 Iron Dome] The new dome of the Capitol, completed in 1866. The old wooden dome had been removed in 1856.

12.1 Ancient of Days] God (Daniel 17:9).

14.4 Sumter’s cannon roar] When Confederate artillery fired on Union soldiers garrisoned at Fort Sumter, Charleston, South Carolina, on April 12, 1861, the Union garrison returned fire, marking the beginning of the Civil War.

14.18 First Manassas] Fought in northern Virginia on July 21, 1861, the battle, also known as First Bull Run, ended in a Union rout. Expecting an easy Union victory, hundreds of civilians, including several congressmen, rode out from Washington to nearby Centerville, Virginia, to watch the battle, bringing picnic baskets and opera glasses.

15.22 Lyon] Brigadier General Nathaniel Lyon (1818–1861) was killed while leading 5,400 Union troops against 11,000 Confederates in the battle of Wilson’s Creek (also known as Oak Hills), fought near Springfield, Missouri, on August 10, 1861. The battle ended in a Union retreat. Lyon was the first Union general to die in combat in the Civil War.

17.6 Indians] A small number of Confederate Cherokees and Choctaws fought in the battle of Wilson’s Creek.

18.1 Ball’s Bluff] A Union attack across the Potomac at Ball’s Bluff, near Leesburg, Virginia, on October 21, 1861, was repulsed with the loss of 900 men killed, wounded, or captured.

18.19 sleep bereft] See John Keats, “Isabella; or, the Pot of Basil” (1818), line 323: “As when of healthful midnight sleep bereft.”

18.25 Dupont’s Round Fight] On November 7, 1861, Captain Samuel Francis Du Pont (1803–1865), commander of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, captured the Confederate fortifications at the entrance of Port Royal Sound, South Carolina, bringing a large part of the Sea Islands under Union control. Du Pont ordered his ships to steam in an elliptical formation during their bombardment of the Confederate forts.

19.9 The Stone Fleet] The Union navy sank sixteen stone-laden ships, many of them old whaling vessels, off Charleston, South Carolina, on December 19–20, 1861, in an unsuccessful attempt to block the mouth of the harbor.

19.28 escheat] Forfeited.

20.17 Donelson] Union forces under Ulysses S. Grant (1822–1885) laid siege to Fort Donelson, Tennessee, on February 12, 1862. After five days of fighting, more than 12,000 Confederates surrendered unconditionally on February 16, 1862.

20.19–22 The bitter cup . . . wormwood in the mouth] An allusion to the Trent Affair. On November 8, 1861, the USS San Jacinto intercepted the British mail packet Trent off Cuba and removed Confederate diplomatic envoys James M. Mason and John Slidell, who were en route to England and France. The British government strongly protested the boarding of the Trent, and on December 26 the Lincoln administration decided to release the envoys in order to avoid a possible war with Great Britain.

21.3 Marching from Henry overland] The Union expedition up the Tennessee River captured Fort Henry on February 6. Grant then marched his troops overland to Fort Donelson on the Cumberland River.

24.35 Copperhead] Any Northerner who opposed the Civil War and advocated a negotiated settlement with the South.

29.28 wafered square] Splattered with water drops.

31.7 Lew Wallace] Brigadier General Lew Wallace (1827–1905), later governor of the New Mexico Territory (1878–1905) and the author of Ben-Hur (1880).

33.17 The Cumberland] The wooden sloop-of-war USS Cumberland, rammed and sunk by the ironclad CSS Virginia at Hamptons Roads, Virginia, on March 8, 1862. The crew of the Cumberland refused to surrender even after the ship began to take on water.

34.26 Worden] Lieutenant John Lorimer Worden (1818–1897), commander of the ironclad USS Monitor. On March 9, 1862, the Monitor engaged in an indecisive four-hour battle with the ironclad CSS Virginia at Hamptons Roads, Virginia, only a day after the latter had sunk the USS Cumberland and USS Congress. During the battle, Worden, stationed within the Monitor’s revolving gun turret, was seriously wounded.

35.2–3 Alcides . . . Admetus’ bride] After Alcestis volunteered to die instead of her husband, King Admetus of Pherae (in Thessaly), by the arrangement of Apollo (then required to serve Admetus), sent Alcides (Hercules) to bring her back from the underworld. The story of Apollo’s servitude recurs in “In the Hall of Marbles” (p. 874) and in Clarel (247.5–9).

36.5 The Temeraire] HMS Temeraire figured prominently in the British victory over the French and Spanish fleet at Trafalgar in 1805. J.M.W. Turner’s painting The “Fighting Temeraire” Tugged to Her Last Berth to Be Broken Up (1838) depicts the ship being towed by a steamboat.

36.7 Monitor and Merrimac)] See note 34.26. The battle between the Monitor and the Virginia (formerly USS Merrimack) was the first engagement in naval history between ironclad ships.

37.11 The Victory, whose Admiral] HMS Victory was the flagship at Trafalgar of Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson (1758–1805), who was fatally wounded during the battle.

37.14 angel in that sun.] Revelation 10:1.

39.3 Shiloh] The battle of Shiloh, fought April 6–7, 1862, near Pittsburg Landing, Tennessee, ended in a Union victory. The combined Union and Confederate casualties were nearly 24,000 men killed, wounded, or missing.

39.25 The Battle for the Mississippi] A Union fleet commanded by Flag Officer David G. Farragut (1801–1870) forced the passage between Forts Jackson and St. Philip on the lower Mississippi on the night of April 24, 1862. The fleet then sailed about seventy miles upriver to New Orleans, which surrendered on April 25.

39.27 Migdol hoar] Migdol (“tower”), a prominent landmark near the Red Sea (see Numbers 33:7 and Exodus 14:2).

39.28 shawm] Old form of an oboe—thrown down, Melville means, during the initial despair of the Israelites after crossing the Red Sea.

39.30 Pharaoh’s stranded crew] Numbers 14 explains how Pharaoh and his army were “stranded.”

40.1 The Lord is a man of war!] Exodus 15:3.

40.20 The manned Varuna] USS Varuna, a Union steam-powered gunboat, sank after being repeatedly rammed by Confederate vessels during the naval battle fought on April 24.

40.25 The Ram Manassas] CSS Manassas, an ironclad ram that caught fire and exploded during the battle.

41.17 Malvern Hill] The Union army commanded by Major General George B. McClellan (1826–1885) repulsed repeated Confederate attacks at Malvern Hill, Virginia, on July 1, 1862.

41.25 cartridge in their mouth] Soldiers in the Civil War loaded gunpowder into their rifle muskets by biting open paper cartridges and then pouring the powder down the muzzle.

42.2 Seven Nights and Days] In the Seven Days’ Battles outside Richmond, which began at Oak Grove on June 25, 1862, and ended July 1, 1862, at Malvern Hill, Robert E. Lee (1807–1870) succeeded in driving McClellan away from the eastern approaches to the city and caused him to retreat into a defensive position along the James River.

42.22 The Victor of Antietam] The victor of Antietam is Major General George B. McClellan. Fought on September 17, 1862, near Antietam Creek outside of Sharpsburg, Maryland, the battle of Antietam was an important tactical victory for the Union, ending Robert E. Lee’s first invasion of the North and permitting Lincoln to issue a preliminary Emancipation Proclamation. Lincoln, however, relieved McClellan of his command of the Army of the Potomac for failing to pursue a retreating Robert E. Lee.

43.11–14 You, the Discarded . . . Arrayed Pope’s rout] McClellan was removed by Lincoln as general in chief of the Union armies on July 11, 1862, after the unsuccessful Peninsula campaign to capture Richmond. Then, on August 3, 1862, McClellan was ordered by the new general in chief, Henry Halleck, to abandon his campaign on the Virginia Peninsula and send the troops of the Army of the Potomac north to join the newly formed Army of Virginia under John Pope. After John Pope was defeated by Robert E. Lee at the Second Bull Run (Second Manassas), August 28–30, McClellan was restored to active command on September 2 and given authority over Pope’s troops as well as those of the Army of the Potomac.

44.27 Battle of Stone River, Tennessee] At the battle of Stones River (also known as Murfreesboro), December 31, 1862–January 2, 1863, Confederate Generals John Breckinridge (1821–1875) and Braxton Bragg (1817–1876) failed to drive Union forces under General William Rosecrans (1819–1898) from middle Tennessee. The combined Union and Confederate casualties were more than 24,000 men killed, wounded, or missing.

44.30 Tewksbury and Barnet heath] Sites of 1471 battles between the forces of York and Lancaster, familiar to Melville from Henry VI, Part III, and Richard III.

46.1–2 Running the Batteries . . . Vicksburgh] On the night of April 16, 1863, the Mississippi River Squadron under the command of Acting Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter (1813–1891) ran past Confederate batteries at Vicksburg, Mississippi, beginning the campaign that ended with the surrender of the city to Major General Ulysses S. Grant on July 4, 1863. With the fall of Vicksburg and, five days later, Port Hudson, the Union could freely navigate the Mississippi from its source to New Orleans.

46.27 Shadrach . . . Abed-nego] Daniel 3:12.

48.15 So Porter proves himself] Acting Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter was promoted to Rear Admiral for his crucial role in the capture of Vicksburg. See Melville’s note.

48.16 Stonewall Jackson] Confederate Lieutenant General Thomas (Stonewall) Jackson (1824–1863) led a successful attack against the exposed right flank of the Union army on May 2, 1863, during the battle of Chancellorsville. He was mortally wounded that evening when his own men mistook his returning scouting party for Union cavalry in the darkness and opened fire.

49.24 Romney march] Jackson led an expedition that left Winchester, Virginia, on January 1, 1862. After marching over icy roads in sleet storms, his forces occupied Romney, Virginia (now in West Virginia), on January 14.

49.27 Wind of the Shenandoah] During his campaign in the Shenandoah Valley, May 8–June 9, 1862, Jackson’s troops marched 350 miles, defeated three different Union commands in five battles, and succeeded in keeping nearly 60,000 Union troops from advancing on Richmond.

49.28 Gaines’s Mill] After leaving the Shenandoah Valley, Jackson’s command joined Lee’s army outside of Richmond and helped defeat Union forces at Gaines’ Mill, the third of the Seven Days’ Battles (see note 42.2), on June 27, 1862.

49.29 Manassas-plain] On August 25, 1862, Lee sent Jackson’s wing of the Army of Northern Virginia on a flanking march to the west of John Pope’s army. Jackson destroyed Pope’s supply base at Manassas Junction and then drew him into battle, leading to the Confederate victory at Second Manassas (Second Bull Run), August 28–30, 1862.

50.4 “My Maryland!”] A band had played the pro-secessionist song “Maryland, My Maryland” as Jackson’s corps crossed the Potomac at White’s Ford on September 5, 1862.

50.5 red Antietam’s field] Antietam was the bloodiest single day of the Civil War, with nearly 23,000 soldiers killed, wounded, or missing.

50.9–10 Marye’s slope . . . the shock and the fame] At the battle of Fredericksburg, December 13, 1863, Union soldiers found a breach in the Confederate right flank on Prospect Hill, surprising Jackson and causing the Confederate line to begin to roll up, before Jackson responded with a successful counterattack (Marye’s Heights, on the Confederate left, was held by James Longstreet’s corps).

50.11 Moss-Neck] Moss Neck Manor, a plantation in Caroline County, Virginia, where Jackson established his winter quarters in 1862–63 and hosted Christmas dinner for Generals Robert E. Lee, J.E.B. Stuart, and William Pendleton.

51.1 Gettysburg] The defensive victory won by Major General George Meade’s Army of the Potomac at Gettysburg, July 1–3, 1863, was a turning point in the Civil War, serving as a “check” on Robert E. Lee’s second invasion of the North. Combined Union and Confederate losses were 51,000 men killed, wounded, or missing.

51.7 Dagon] The fish-god of the Philistines (see Judges 16:23).

51.12 He charged] An allusion to Brigadier General George Edward Pickett (1825–1875) and the failed assault by three Confederate divisions on the Union center at Gettysburg on July 3, popularly known as “Pickett’s Charge.”

52.6 The House-top] Under the conscription act signed by President Lincoln in March 1863, men who had been selected to be drafted could avoid service by hiring a substitute or by paying a $300 commutation fee. The new conscription act particularly angered New York’s poor Irish immigrants. The first draft lottery conducted in New York City under the act was held on July 11, 1863. Two days later mobs attacked draft offices in the city, beginning five days of looting, arson, and violence. Blacks, easy scapegoats for anger, were beaten, dragged through the streets, and lynched. The Colored Orphan Asylum on Fifth Avenue was burned to the ground, the children narrowly escaping.

52.9 No sleep.] The poem recalls the opening of The Curse of Kahema (1810) by Robert Southey, the English Poet Laureate of Melville’s youth.

53.1 Look-out Mountain] In the “battle above the clouds,” fought in heavy mist and rain on November 24, 1863, Union troops under Major General Joseph Hooker (1814–1879) drove Confederate forces from much of Lookout Mountain just outside of Chattanooga, Tennessee. Firing between the opposing sides continued into the night, when the Confederates withdrew the rest of their forces.

53.8 Kaf the peak of Eblis] In Islamic mythology, the chief fallen angel, Iblis, lives on Mount Kaf.

54.5 their General’s plan] On the afternoon of November 25, 1863, Grant ordered the Army of the Cumberland, commanded by Major General George H. Thomas, to capture the line of Confederate rifle pits at the base of Missionary Ridge. The advancing Union troops quickly overran the first Confederate position and then continued up the ridge, capturing its crest and forcing the Confederates to retreat into northern Georgia.

56.1 The Armies of the Wilderness] The Wilderness, a dense second-growth forest of scrub oak, pine, and underbrush in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, was the scene of two major Civil War battles: the battle of Chancellorsville, May 1–4, 1863, in which Lee succeeded in driving the Union army back across the Rappahannock River, and the battle of the Wilderness, in which Lee attacked the Union army as it moved south through the woods, May 5–6, 1864, but failed to prevent Grant from continuing his southward advance toward Spotsylvania Court House.

57.6 Beliel’s wily plea] Beliel’s arguments in Paradise Lost, II.108–228, are not to enlist fighters, since he advises (line 228) “ignoble ease, and peaceful sloth,” not peace and not war.

58.6 Paran] In Genesis and Numbers, regularly referred to as a “wilderness,” as in the title of this poem. Nabal of Paran is described as a son of Belial (1 Samuel 25:17).

58.19 field-mouse . . . ant] See the revenge tragedy The White Devil, V.iv.109, by English playwright John Webster (c. 1580–c. 1634): “The ant, the field-mouse, and the mole.”

59.12 Lord Fairfax’s parchment deeds] Thomas, the sixth Lord Fairfax of Cameron (1693–1781), was the proprietor of more than five million acres of land between the Rappahannock and Potomac Rivers known as the Northern Neck of Virginia.

60.4 quiet Man] Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant.

60.20 Mosby’s prowling men] Confederate officer John Singleton Mosby (1833–1916) commanded a company of Confederate cavalry raiders who operated behind the Union lines in northern Virginia.

61.23 Stonewall had charged] See note 48.15.

62.24 Longstreet] Confederate Lieutenant General James Longstreet (1821–1904) led a successful attack against the Union lines in the Wilderness on May 6, 1864, which faltered after he was accidentally wounded by Confederate soldiers.

63.2 Sabæan lore] Perhaps the tales behind the riddles the Queen of Sheba (Saba, on the Arabian peninsula) posed to Solomon (1 Kings 10:1–3).

63.13 On the Photograph of a Corps Commander] The corps commander in question is Union Major General Winfield Scott Hancock (1824–1886).

63.18 Spottsylvania’s charge to victory] On May 12, 1864, Hancock’s Second Corps of the Army of the Potomac captured the “Mule Shoe,” a fortified salient at the center of the Confederate lines at Spotsylvania Court House, Virginia.

64.7 The Swamp Angel] Moniker given by Union soldiers to the eight-inch Parrott gun that began shelling Charleston, South Carolina, at a range of four and a half miles on August 22, 1863. Positioned on a battery built between Morris and James Islands, the gun fired thirty-six 150-pound shells before its breech burst on August 23. The Union bombardment of Charleston resumed on November 16, 1863, and continued until the Confederate evacuation of the city on February 18, 1865.

65.22 The Battle for the Bay] In the battle of Mobile Bay, August 5, 1864, Rear Admiral David G. Farragut’s squadron defeated the Confederate flotilla under the command of Admiral Franklin Buchanan (1800–1874). The Union victory closed off the main Confederate port on the Gulf of Mexico.

66.21 He lashed himself aloft] Farragut was lashed to the rigging of the mainmast of the USS Hartford in order to get a clear view of the action.

66.29 the forts] The entrance to Mobile Bay was guarded by Fort Gaines and Fort Morgan.

66.34 Dim buoys . . . hint of death below] Buoys marked the location of anchored torpedoes (mines) at the entrance to Mobile Bay; passage around the easternmost buoy minefield forced attacking vessels within range of Fort Morgan’s guns.

67.3 The Tecumseh!] The USS Tecumseh, an ironclad monitor, was leading the squadron past Fort Morgan when it struck a torpedo and sank, with the loss of ninety-three lives.

67.27 Selma strikes] CSS Selma, a wooden side-wheel gunboat, struck its colors and surrendered to the USS Metacomet.

67.29 the Tennessee!] The ironclad ram CSS Tennessee served as Admiral Buchanan’s flagship during the battle. The Tennessee was rammed by several ships in Farragut’s squadron.

69.1 Sheridan at Cedar Creek] At dawn on October 19, 1864, Confederate troops under Lieutenant General Jubal A. Early (1816–1894) surprised Union forces at Cedar Creek, Virginia, and drove them from their positions. Major General Philip Henry Sheridan (1831–1888), who was returning to his command from a conference in Washington, learned of the attack in Winchester, Virginia, and rode to the front on his horse Rienzi, rallying stragglers and directing a successful counterattack.

70.8 In the Prison Pen] The prisoner exchange cartel that negotiated between the Union and Confederate armies in July 1862 began to break down in the summer of 1863 because of the Confederate refusal to treat black soldiers and their officers as prisoners of war. By 1864 an increasing number of prisoners on both sides were being held in overcrowded stockades. During the war at least 30,000 Union and 26,000 Confederate soldiers died while being held as prisoners.

71.1 The College Colonel] Inspired by William Francis Bartlett (1840–1876), a Harvard student who was commissioned as a captain in a Massachusetts regiment in 1861. Bartlett lost a leg in the Peninsula Campaign in 1862, but remained in the army and organized a new regiment. He was wounded again at Port Hudson and in the Wilderness before being captured in the Petersburg mine crater battle on July 30, 1864. Bartlett spent two months in Libby Prison in Richmond until he was exchanged.

72.1 The Eagle of the Blue] See Melville’s note about Northwestern regiments that kept eagles as mascots.

73.1 A Dirge for McPherson] Major General James B. McPherson (1828–1864), commander of the Army of the Tennessee, was killed by Confederate gunfire in the battle of Atlanta, fought east of the city on July 22, 1864.

74.8 he urged his keel] An allusion to William Barker Cushing (1842–1874), who sailed a steam launch up the Roanoke River on the night of October 27–28, 1864, and used a spar torpedo to sink the Confederate ironclad ram CSS Albemarle at its moorings in Plymouth, North Carolina, making him a national hero.

74.30 imps] Strengthens, propels, as a consequence of repair made to wing or tail feathers, in falconry.

75.7 The March to the Sea] The scorched-earth campaign of Major General William Tecumseh Sherman (1820–1891), beginning with the departure of Union troops from Atlanta on November 16, 1864, and ending with the occupation of Savannah on December 21, 1864. Sherman’s army of 60,000 men marched on a front fifty to sixty miles across, engaging in widespread destruction of both public and private property.

75.9–10 Kenesaw . . . Allatoona’s glen] Confederate forces opposing the Union advance on Atlanta retreated to a defense line anchored on Kennesaw Mountain, Georgia, on June 18, 1864. Sherman launched an unsuccessful frontal assault on the Confederate positions on June 27, then outflanked the Confederates on July 2 and forced them to retreat to the Chattahoochee River. A Union garrison guarding the Atlanta–Chattanooga railroad at Allatoona Pass, Georgia, repulsed a Confederate assault on October 5, 1864.

76.1 Kilpatrick’s] Brigadier General Judson Kilpatrick (1822–1898) commanded Sherman’s cavalry division during the March to the Sea.

78.1 The Frenzy in the Wake] Sherman left Savannah on February 1, 1865, and began marching into South Carolina, where his army inflicted greater destruction on private homes and property than in Georgia. The Union advance reached Fayetteville, North Carolina, on March 11 and Raleigh on April 13.

78.14 Sisera’s brow] Jael, the wife of Heber, killed Sisera, a Canaanite oppressor of the Israelites, by driving a nail through his temple as he slept (Judges 4:21).

79.1 The Fall of Richmond] Following the Union victory at Five Forks, Virginia, on April 1, 1865, Grant ordered a general assault against the Petersburg defenses at dawn on April 2. The attack broke through the Confederate lines, forcing Lee to evacuate Petersburg and Richmond that night. Retreating soldiers set fire to Richmond’s stockpiles of cotton and tobacco to prevent them from falling into Union hands; the flames soon spread and caused extensive destruction in the city.

79.14 dilated Lucifer] See Paradise Lost, IV.985–86.

80.1 The Surrender at Appomattox] Outnumbered and surrounded, Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, on April 9, 1865, effectively bringing the Civil War to an end.

80.10 sword that Grant received from Lee.] Lee did not literally give his sword to Grant at the surrender.

82.20 15th of April, 1865] John Wilkes Booth (1838–1865) shot Abraham Lincoln on Good Friday, April 14, 1865, at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C.; Lincoln died the following morning.

83.25–26 A Picture by S. R. Gifford . . . the N.A. Exhibition, April, 1865] A Coming Storm (1865), by Hudson River School painter Sanford Robinson Gifford (1823–1880), appeared in the National Academy of Design’s annual exhibition in New York City in 1865. The painting was listed in the exhibition catalogue as owned by Edwin Booth (1833–1893), the celebrated Shakespearean actor and brother of Lincoln’s assassin, John Wilkes Booth.

84.13 Rebel Color-bearers at Shiloh] The newspaper account of Shiloh that Melville refers to in his note was the lengthy dispatch by Whitelaw Reid (1837–1912) that appeared in the Cincinnati Gazette under the pen name “Agate,” April 14–15, 1862.

85.19 how Grant met Lee.] Grant’s terms of surrender at Appomattox Court House were as generous as could be expected: Lee’s troops must give up their arms and return home on parole, “not to be disturbed by United States Authority so long as they observe their parole and the laws in force where they may reside.” They were also permitted to keep their privately owned horses and mules.

87.22 Nineveh of the North] New York City, as described in Melville’s notes.

88.5–7 Hill . . . Stuart] Lieutenant General A. P. Hill (1825–1865), one of Lee’s corps commanders, killed at Petersburg on April 2, 1865; Brigadier General Turner Ashby (1828–1862), a cavalry commander who served under Stonewall Jackson in the Shenandoah Valley, killed near Harrisonburg, Virginia, on June 6, 1862; Lieutenant General J.E.B. Stuart, Lee’s cavalry commander, fatally wounded at Yellow Tavern, Virginia, on May 11, 1864.

89.18 “Formerly a Slave”] The painting by Elihu Vedder (1836–1923) appeared in the exhibition catalogue as “Jane Jackson, formerly a slave. . . .”

90.5 The Apparition] Plausibly about the explosion set off in the Confederate camp at Petersburg, Virginia, from beneath, in a Union tunnel, in July 1864.

92.11–12 Apollo-like . . . Python] Melville owned an engraving of Turner’s depiction of Apollo slaying the monstrous Python that had survived the Flood. See Clarel (256.33–34).

93.20 Fierce was Despair] See Paradise Lost, where Moloch, “fiercer by despair” (II.45), votes for open war (II.42–108) while Belial temporizes, fearful of worse punishment (II.108–225).

95.3 On the Home Guards] The secessionist Missouri State Guard laid siege to Lexington, Missouri, on September 12, 1861, and captured the town on September 20 after fighting in which thirty-nine men from the Lexington garrison, including members of the unionist Missouri Home Guards, were killed.

95.13 Pea Ridge, Arkansas] The battle of Pea Ridge (or Elkhorn Tavern), fought near Leetown in northwestern Arkansas on March 7–8, 1862, ended in a Union victory.

96.2 Disaster of the Second Manassas] Also known as Second Bull Run, the battle, fought August 28–30, 1862, between Union forces under John Pope (1822–1892) and the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia led by Robert E. Lee, ended in a decisive Confederate victory. Union losses in the battle totaled almost 14,000 men killed, wounded, or missing.

96.13 Victory of Baton Rouge, Louisiana] Union forces repulsed a Confederate attempt to recapture the strategic city of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on August 5, 1862. The 14th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment reported that it lost thirty-six men killed in the battle.

97.6 Marye’s Heights, Fredericksburg] Marye’s Heights, a hill behind the town of Fredericksburg, Virginia, was the site of two different battles and is the location of the Fredericksburg National Cemetery, established in 1865. In the battle of Fredericksburg, on December 13, 1862, one of the deadliest of the Civil War, the Army of the Potomac failed to capture Marye’s Heights. Union troops captured the heights on May 3, 1863, during the Second Battle of Fredericksburg, but retreated across the Rappahannock River the next day.

98.1 On the Slain at Chickamauga] The battle of Chickamauga, fought in northwestern Georgia on September 19–20, 1863, ended in a Confederate victory. The combined Union and Confederate casualties exceeded 34,000 men killed, wounded, or missing.

98.18 Battle-fields of the Wilderness] See note 56.1.

99.1–2 On Sherman’s Men . . . Kenesaw Mountain] Union forces lost almost 3,000 men killed, wounded, or missing in an unsuccessful assault on Confederate positions at Kennesaw Mountain, Georgia, on June 27, 1864 (see note 75.9–10).

100.18–19 On a natural Monument in a field of Georgia] From February 1864 to May 1865 more than 45,000 Union soldiers were held at Andersonville prison camp, and almost 13,000 died from malnutrition, disease, and exposure. Andersonville National Cemetery was established on July 26, 1865. Scutari, the Constantinople district mentioned by Melville in his note, was the site of British army hospitals and barracks where more than 5,400 soldiers died during the Crimean War.

101.15 damasked blade] Fine blade, made in Damascus.

103.8 Mosby’s men] Confederate cavalry officer John S. Mosby (1833–1916) was given command in January 1863 of a small detachment of Confederate partisan rangers in northern Virginia. Using guerrilla tactics, Mosby raided Union outposts and supply wagons in Fairfax, Prince William, Fauquier, and Loudoun Counties, sometimes striking within fifteen miles of Washington. In April 1864, Melville went to Virginia to visit his cousin Lieutenant Colonel Henry Gansevoort (1835–1871), commander of the 13th New York Cavalry Regiment, and accompanied his men on an expedition into Loudoun County in search of Mosby and his rangers.

104.9 The Leader] The camp’s commander, Colonel Charles Russell Lowell (1835–1864) of the Second Massachusetts Cavalry Regiment, nephew of the poet James Russell Lowell. Mortally wounded at the battle of Cedar Creek, northeast of Strasburg, Virginia, on October 19, 1864, Lowell died the following day.

104.13 sunny bride] Josephine (Effy) Shaw Lowell (1843–1905), who in her decades as a widow became a prominent national reformer.

116.31 inward bruise] Henry IV, Part I, I.iii.58.

116.34 Boots and saddles!] Bugle call warning the cavalry to be ready to mount and ride. (The calls at 10.4 and 104.15 are different.)

126.2 Lee in the Capitol] Robert E. Lee appeared before the congressional Joint Committee on Reconstruction on February 17, 1866, but the speech in Melville’s poem is fictional.

126.30 Arlington] Arlington House, Mary Custis Lee’s family estate and Lee’s home before the Civil War. In 1864, the estate became the site of Arlington National Cemetery.

127.5 Of Pope’s impelled retreat] See note 96.2.

131.2 Sylla’s way] After seizing power by force, the Roman dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix (139–78 B.C.E.) initiated proscriptions, identifying certain Roman citizens as his enemies and (at the lightest) confiscating their property.

133.4 fields in Mexico] Many of the officers who fought on opposing sides in the Civil War had served together during the Mexican-American War, 1846–48.

133.19 on the Hudson’s marge] United States Military Academy at West Point.

133.33 When Vicksburg fell] On July 4, 1863, the city surrendered after a siege of forty-three days.

137.26–27 Sarpedon] A slip for Hector, who avenged Sarpedon’s death at the hands of Patroclus, Achilles’ friend. In quoting (without naming) General W. T. Sherman, probably from the April 1866 Hours at Home, Melville omits the words after “avenged his death”: “avenged his death, for the slaughter of the enemy exceeded any thing I have seen during the war.”

144.34–37 George IV . . . Preston Pans] As Prince Regent, George IV provided a stipend to the last heirs of James II and later contributed to build a monument to the Stuarts in St. Peter’s Basilica. A Highland army led by Prince Charles Stuart defeated British forces at Prestonpans, near Edinburgh, on September 21, 1745.

CLAREL: A POEM AND PILGRIMAGE IN THE HOLY LAND

Part One: Jerusalem

161.7–8 Elbow on knee . . . sidelong hand] Clarel’s pose recalls John Keats’s as portrayed by Joseph Severn and William Hilton in their respective paintings, head supported by “sidelong hand”—the word “sidelong” occurring in Endymion, “The Eve of Saint Mark,” and “La Belle Dame Sans Merci.”

165.34 slim vial] A mezuzah, identifying those who dwell there as Jewish.

166.19–21 Ten . . . time.] After the twelve tribes, descendants of the twelve sons of Jacob, were exiled to Assyria in the eighth century B.C.E., the ten tribes from northern Israel were assimilated or otherwise lost, leaving the southern tribes of Judah and Benjamin to “live on” in the historical record.

166.33–35 Esdras saith . . . still eastward.] According to 2 Esdras 13:40–50 (in the Apocrypha) the ten tribes traveled a year and a half east of the Euphrates to Azareth, from which, Esdras said, they would return.

170.30 four Kings’ check] In Genesis 14, Abraham pursues and defeats four kings to rescue his nephew Lot, after which Melchizedek, the King of Salem, blesses Abraham.

172.18 a’Becket’s slayers] At the instigation of Henry II in 1170, Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, was murdered in his cathedral, the four assassins unpunished but dying in Jerusalem, where the Pope had ordered them.

173.22–23 Ludovico . . . chamber] “Ludovico in the Haunted Chamber” is the title of Leigh Hunt’s excerpt from Ann Radcliffe’s Gothic romance The Mysteries of Udolpho in his 1849 A Book for a Corner.

174.7 Godfrey and Baldwin] The Crusader Godfrey of Boulogne, Defender of the Holy Sepulcher at the end of the eleventh century, and his brother Baldwin, who succeeded him as King of Jerusalem (1100–1118).

174.11–12 fancy . . . Imagination] The distinction invoked here is Coleridge’s in his Biographia Literaria: fancy is the trivial organizing power, and imagination the higher creative power.

174.16 three pale Marys’ frame] The three Marys present at the Crucifixion (John 19:25).

174.17 she moves] She (Imagination) moves back in time from Lazarus’s house in Bethany to Golgotha.

174.35 knights so shy] In his Walks About the City and Environs of Jerusalem (184–?), a book purchased by Melville, W. H. Bartlett (1809–1854) quotes Tasso on the humility of the Crusaders on first approaching Jerusalem. He quotes (but does not identify) Gibbon on the Crusaders’ “promiscuous massacre” of “seventy thousand Moslims” and many harmless Jews.

175.1 to quote Voltaire] The French Enlightenment writer is said to have declared that the Crusades were “an epidemic of fury which lasted two hundred years.”

175.17 Tancred knew] In Walks About the City, Bartlett quotes Edward Gibbon on the “savage heroes of the cross” of whom only Tancred showed “some sentiments of compassion.”

176.11 to temple drew] For the feast of Passover; Jesus’s Passover in Jerusalem at age twelve is in Luke 2:41–50.

178.25 St. Paul] In Acts 27, Paul, a prisoner during a storm at sea, instructs the Roman centurion Julius how to save all the men aboard the ship.

180.25 Compostel or brown Loret] Two famous destinations for Christian pilgrims: the shrine to the apostle James in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, and the shrine to the Virgin Mary, her house (made of light brown bricks) miraculously transported first from Nazareth to Croatia, and then from Croatia to Loreto, Italy.

183.4–5 voice of bridegroom . . . hushed.] In Revelation 18:23, John says that at the fall of Babylon “the voice of the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard no more at all.”

183.10 Jaffa Gate] Main western gate to Jerusalem, through which Melville entered the city in 1857.

183.21 it came in random play] Clarel remembers that Jaffa Gate opens to the road to Emmaus, where Jesus appeared to two followers after his resurrection (Luke 24:13–35).

184.25–31 book . . . wasteful element] Life of Benjamin Robert Haydon, Historical Painter (1853) tells of Keats’s making his friend Joseph Ritchie “promise he would carry his Endymion to the great desert of Sahara and fling it in the midst.”

185.23 beryl . . . St. John] The eighth foundation of the city John envisions is decorated with beryl (Revelation 21:20).

185.36 he of Tarsus roved.] After his conversion as an apostle for Christianity, Paul, originally named Saul (Acts of the Apostles 13:9), born in the city of Tarsus (in present-day Turkey) and fortunate in being a Roman citizen, “roved” Turkey and Greece on three trips, then went to Italy, where he was martyred. In 2 Corinthians 11:25–27, Paul summarizes some perils and pains of his “journeyings.”

186.5 fluttering like tongues] Acts 2 describes how, after Jesus has risen to heaven, the Holy Spirit in a “rushing mighty wind” filled the house where his apostles had gathered on Pentecost. When “cloven tongues like as of fire” sat upon them, they could speak all the languages of the region and thus spread the news of Jesus.

186.17 Ravens and angels] In 1 Kings 17:6, ravens bring Elijah bread and flesh morning and evening while he is hiding from the evil King Ahab.

186.34 A Santon] An Islamic holy man, allowed free movement.

188.14–27 serial wrecks . . . Glenroy’s tiers] This list of wrecks buried beneath Jerusalem concludes with an allusion to the strata at Glen Roy, in the Highlands of Scotland, the subject of respectfully argued theories of Charles Darwin, Louis Agassiz, and others.

189.12–13 “Adonijah . . . Zoheleth.”] 1 Kings 1 tells of Adonijah’s futile opposition to Solomon’s succeeding David and his sacrificing at the sacred stone of Zoheleth.

189.40 The field of blood . . . Aceldama] The panicked Judas gave his thirty pieces of silver (for which he betrayed Jesus) to the chief priests. Wary because it was blood money, they used it to buy the potter’s field Aceldama known forever afterward as “the Field of Blood” (Matthew 27:3–10; Acts 1:16–19).

190.6 Christ’s resort] The Mount of Olives. See Luke 21:37: “And in the day time he was teaching in the temple; and at night he went out, and abode in the mount that is called the mount of Olives.”

193.16 Christ’s bondman] Jesus’s slave, Nehemiah.

194.24 Absalom’s locks but Æsop’s hump] 2 Samuel 14:25: “[I]n all Israel there was none to be so much praised as Absalom for his beauty: from the sole of his foot even to the crown of his head there was no blemish in him.” Aesop, the putative writer of fables, was depicted as hideous; in his lecture “Statues in Rome” Melville described a bust in which Aesop was “dwarfed and deformed,” though enlivened “by a lambent gleam of irony.”

198.2 arch named Ecce Homo] One of the stations along the route to the Crucifixion. In John 19:1–5 Pilate displays the scourged and mocked Jesus to the crowd, saying “Behold the man.”

198.25 My God . . . forsakest me?] Matthew 27:46.

200.30–31 Savonarola’s zeal . . . died out] The religious and political zeal of the Dominican friar Girolamo Savonarola (1452–1498) ended when he was hanged and his body burned (with sticks of wood, fagots).

200.32–33 Leopardi . . . St. Stephen] Giacomo Leopardi (1798–1837), the miserably frail Italian philologist and poet who died at forty, skeptical of any optimism, metaphorically stoned himself to death with grief, but Stephen, the first Christian martyr, was killed with real stones (Acts 7:59–60).

201.19–20 looking down . . . vacant glen] These lines recall Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” and “The City in the Sea.”

205.34 the Ezan] Islamic call to worship.

209.15 Levite trains] The Levites were not priests but servants of the Temple.

209.34 Shaddai] Jehovah.

211.17 features finely Hagrene] Resembling those of Hagar, Abraham’s concubine and mother of Ishmael.

214.11 the Slide! the Slide!] Melville quotes Hawthorne’s “The Ambitious Guest.”

214.26 dusty book] The floured book is Thomas Paine’s Deistic The Age of Reason (1794 and later), which was banned in England, and condemned in the United States for its hostility to organized religions, and its denial of special revelations.

216.8 Favonius] The west wind.

216.20 Ceres] Roman goddess of fertility and agriculture.

217.8 Nerea’s amorous net] Nerea, one of the Greek sea-nymphs.

219.30 Pequod wilds] The southern New England forests inhabited by the Pequod or Pequot Indians.

221.27 Angelico] Fra Angelico (1387–1455), the great Florentine painter, known best for his frescoes.

224.15 faith’s receding wave.] In Matthew Arnold’s “Dover Beach” the “Sea of Faith,” once full, withdraws.

226.30 Horeb] Mount Sinai.

228.29 Uz] Empty wasteland mentioned prominently in Job.

230.9–10 the angel succorer . . . Peter dungeoned.] Acts 12:1–19.

230.21–22 affright . . . Eliphaz the Temanite] The fright of Eliphaz the Temanite, one of Job’s three “comforters,” is described in Job 4:13–16.

233.24 tipstaves] Officers, each with a metal-tipped staff. In Matthew 26:47, Judas brings to Gethsemane “a great multitude with swords and staves, sent from the chief priests and elders of the people.” They take Jesus away, by an unspecified route.

235.32–34 lava glen . . . Tycho’s name have given] Lunar crater named for the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe (1546–1601).

236.8 Time was] That is, 1100–1118, while Baldwin was king of Jerusalem.

236.39–40 smothered text . . . Julian’s pagan mind hath vexed] Isaiah 53:2–4, 12. Julian, the last non-Christian Roman emperor (361–363 C.E.), was called the Apostate because he had renounced Christianity.

237.24 Sybella] Sibylla of Anjou (c. 1112–1165). In the Comte de Montalembert’s Life of St. Elizabeth of Hungary, Melville learned how Sybella, Countess of Flanders, sister of Baldwin III, devoted her life to nursing lepers.

241.17 Naomi ere her trial] Before the death of Naomi’s husband and her two sons (Ruth 1:1–3).

243.25–26 thy line, Theocritus . . . Dark Joel’s text] Theocritus, the third century B.C.E. writer, was known for bucolics, in contrast to verses such as Joel 1:15: “Alas for the day! for the day of the Lord is at hand, and as a destruction from the Almighty shall it come.”

245.17 descend unto Siloam.] At the pool of Siloam, the Fountain of the canto title, Jesus healed a blind man (John 1:1–11).

245.29 Science explains it.] In Biblical Researches in Palestine (1841) the geographer Edward Robinson tells how he crawled hundreds of feet underground to show that the pool of Siloam and the Fountain of the Virgin were connected, thereby explaining the mysterious “irregular flow” of Siloam.

245.32–34 angel in Bethesda’s pool . . . made whole?] Another site of a miracle by a pool. In John 5:1–4 many “impotent” (handicapped) people wait by the pool of Bethesda in Jerusalem for an angel to trouble the water; then the first to enter the pool is healed. Jesus heals a man who had suffered for thirty-eight years and never got to the pool fast enough.

245.35 Or, by an equal dream] Vine puts a miracle at Bethesda on a level with legends of the Egyptian god Ammon’s oasis in the Lybian desert.

247.5–8 If use he served not . . . Mammon’s mine?] Paraphrase: If so far Vine had not achieved anything, perhaps he had been awaiting a worthy incentive; better for one like the god Apollo to serve for a time as a humble shepherd (to Admetus, the King of Pherae, in Thessaly) than do mundane work for pay. For the full significance of this story to Melville, see “In the Turret” and “In the Hall of Marbles.”

247.15 Cecilia] Roman Christian martyred in third century C.E., regarded as the patroness of music.

247.40 an Ariel] A trick-playing sprite like the fairy who executes Prospero’s orders in Shakespeare’s The Tempest.

248.5–7 gleamed the richer . . . Golden Bough.] In a dark “ancient wood” (Dryden’s translation of the Aeneid) two doves conduct Aeneas to a tree that bears the Sibyl’s gleaming golden bough, his passport to the underworld where he will see his father. Darkly clad, Vine similarly gleams out from his obscure setting.

249.3 Dathan swallowed . . . mine] Dathan and his brother Abiram, trouble-making rebels among the Israelites Moses led out of Egypt, are punished in Numbers 16:31: “And the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up.”

249.16 the kiss.] Matthew 26:49.

250.6 James and Peter fell asleep] In Matthew 26:40, James and Peter fall asleep while Jesus is praying at Gethsemane.

250.30 a quiet sign] Vine imitates Jesus at Gethsemane (Matthew 26:45).

251.7 Paul Pry] From the title character of the 1826 London farce by John Poole, a busy, meddling, intrusive person, nosy to the point of madness.

252.7 Baalbec] Ancient city (located in present-day Lebanon). Its extensive ruins include temples of Jupiter, Bacchus, and Venus, and a mosque.

253.3–4 Christ’s belfry . . . Moslem minaret!] Melville underlined part of this passage in his copy of Arthur Penrhyn Stanley’s Sinai and Palestine (1857): “Close beside the Christian belfry towers, the minaret of Omar” tells “its well-known story of Arabian devotion and magnanimity.” Omar’s praying inside the Norman church would have made it Islamic from then on. Because of Omar’s restraint, both the church and the minaret guard the Dome of the Rock.

254.9 Queen Helena] Helena, mother of the Emperor of Rome Constantine, built the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, on the site of Christ’s Crucifixion and burial.

254.15 timing well the tide] Rolfe is skeptical of Helena’s son’s timing in making the Roman Empire Christian.

254.23 De Maintenon] Madame de Maintenon (1635–1719), second wife of Louis XIV of France.

254.38 Last time ’twas burnt] In 1808.

255.23 Lima’s first convulsion] In 1746.

256.21 Tyrrhene seas] The Mediterranean off southern Italy (Melville found “Tyrrhene” in Dryden’s translation of the Aeneid).

256.31–32 “Phylæ . . . broken tomb] Modern Philae, now an island in the reservoir of the Aswan Low Dam, once revered as a burying place of the god Osiris.

256.33–257.7 A god . . . my son.] Murdered by his brother Set (not the Python), Osiris is restored to life and conceives Horus, who subsequently restores order. Rolfe fuses Egyptian, Greek, and Christian religions. Melville had an engraving of J.M.W. Turner’s 1860 painting Apollo Killing the Python, depicting Apollo’s slaying of the great snake that had survived the flood in the time of Deucalion (the Greek Noah).

257.10–13 Matthew . . . Hosea?] Matthew 2:13–15 and Hosea 11:1.

257.16 Cicero,”] Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 B.C.E.), Roman consul and great Latin stylist.

259.1 OF RAMA] Rama, the Hindu deity whose story is told in the Indian epic poem Ramayana (c. 300 B.C.E.), composed in Sanskrit.

263.11–13 “How solitary . . . How still!”] Cf. Lamentations 1:1.

263.29 is Niebuhrized.] Modified, updated. Barthold Niebuhr (1776–1831) in Roman History (1827–1828) took the tone of a myth-buster, as in his gleeful sifting of evidence for the Trojan settlement of Rome.

263.36–264.1 Diana’s moon . . . pale Endymion.] Allusion to Martin Farquhar Tupper’s poem “The Moon” (1848), in which Keats’s Endymion is trivialized.

264.31–32 the taint . . . Solomon’s complaint.] See Ecclesiastes 10:1: “Dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savour.”

265.14 ARCULF AND ADAMNAN] Arculf, early French pilgrim to the Holy Land, was shipwrecked in the Hebrides where in St. Columba’s monastery on Iona island he enthralls the abbot Adamnan and worshipful Scots with miracles he had witnessed in Jerusalem.

265.24 Hakeem’s deed] The tenth-century caliph destroyed Helena’s Church of the Holy Sepulcher.

266.3 Saint Columba’s pile] From Ireland, Columba (543?–597) brought Christianity to Iona, in Scotland.

268.6 Pictish storm-king] The ancient Picts inhabited eastern and northern Scotland during the late Iron Age and early Middle Ages; the name refers to their custom of body painting or tattooing.

268.27 But he, the wanderer] Nehemiah.

269.17 son of Kish.”] Saul. See 1 Samuel 9:2: “And he had a son, whose name was Saul, a choice young man, and a goodly.”

270.25–273.4 “I recall . . . calamity but just.] Rolfe tells a version of the sinking of the Essex by a whale in 1820 and the survival of Captain George Pollard after a 2,000-mile voyage to South America, an experience that reversed his adherence to the idea of free will.

272.2 crime abhorred] Cannibalism.

273.5 Silvio Pellico] Italian writer and patriot (1789–1854), imprisoned a decade by the Austrian rulers, subject of Melville’s “Pausilippo (in the Time of Bomba).”

273.15 Laocoon’s serpent] Classical statue excavated in 1506 and put in the Vatican depicts the Trojan Laocoön and his sons in their death throes against snakes.

274.6–8 this single one . . . Psalmist’s making moan] “I watch, and am as a sparrow alone upon the house top” (Psalms 102:7); however, the topic in Psalms 102 is not the loss of a mate.

277.25 Job’s text] Job 19:25.

278.15–17 The blameless simulator . . . Burckhardt.] Johann Ludwig Burckhardt (1784–1817), Swiss explorer, who mastered Near East languages and for years passed as a Muslim. He was the first European to see Petra, later described in John Lloyd Stephens’s Incidents of Travel in Egypt, Arabia Petræa, and the Holy Land (1837). “Blameless,” he sought to understand the mores of the people he lived among and safeguarded fragile oriental documents.

280.3 Nil admirari] Let nothing astonish you.

281.5 Cristina of Coll’alto] In English poet Samuel Rogers’s Italy (1823), “Coll’alto,” the serving girl Christina, the mysterious “White Lady,” is “walled up within the Castle-wall.”

281.19 Vitriolists] Extreme partisans. The word may be a coinage by Melville.

281.31–282.12 volumes . . . St. Mary’s Hall.”] The first book left behind by the presumably fictitious B. L. of Oxford’s Magdalen College expounds Anglican theology, while the second is a quick survey of revolutionary ideas of the last century. In his Das Leben Jésu, David Friedrich Strauss (1808–1874) dismissed miracles as myths: a real Jesus had lived but was not divine. Ernest Renan (1823–1892) in his La vie de Jésus (1863) also denied the miracles in the course of erasing Jesus as Jew. From a phase of honoring the rough nature god, Pan, the book proceeds to Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865), anarchist author of the 1840 What is Property? (Answer: Property is Theft.)

283.1 John’s wilderness] Where John the Baptist preached (Matthew 3:1–3).

286.16 Candlemas] February 2, the day commemorating the purification of Mary and the presentation of Jesus at the Temple.

Part Two: The Wilderness

290.5 the Templar old] The Knights Templars, twelfth-century Catholic military order charged with protecting pilgrims to the Holy Land; immensely wealthy and political.

290.16 Jonathan] A Yankee.

290.35 Talus] Mythical giant bronze automaton of Crete.

292.14–16 Paul’s plea . . . from Athens . . . the Thessalonians] The two epistles to the Thessalonians (the second of which was more certainly written from Athens), urging them to exhibit faith, love, and hope.

292.30 Capuan zest] Self-indulgent, referring to Capua, Italy, proverbial for its luxury.

295.3 Palmer’s Beach] At the Jordan River.

295.24–28 sighing of Ravenna’s wood . . . to solitude.] In this “deep moral fantasy” from Boccaccio’s Decameron a woman is gleeful when the young Guido kills himself out of love for her. She dies and each Friday Guido pursues her through Ravenna’s wood, disembowels her, and feeds her heart to dogs. A living noble, Nastagio, witnesses the ritual and uses it to scare his beloved into marrying him.

296.13–14 wishing-cap . . . Fortunatus.”] In White-Jacket (ch. 41) Melville praises Thomas Dekker’s Old Fortunatus (1599), a retelling of a German folktale, as a “glorious” old drama. In it Fortune offers a poor old man a choice of gifts from which he chooses riches.

296.25 “Pink, pink . . . pink’s the hue] Behind this badinage is Jaques’s “Motley’s the only wear” in As You Like It (II.vii.34).

297.10–12 near gate . . . martyrdom] Near the site of Stephen’s martyrdom (Acts 7:55–60).

299.26 brass . . . cymbal!] Cf. 1 Corinthians 13:1.

301.31 snaffle him with kings] In Leviathan (1651), Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) championed the divine right of kings.

302.5 new world’s chanticleer] In chapter 1 of Walden (1854), Thoreau writes: “I do not propose to write an ode to dejection, but to brag as lustily as chanticleer in the morning, standing on his roost, if only to wake my neighbors up.” The first edition of Walden carried these words as the title-page epigraph.

302.30 This Psalmanazer] In the first decade of the 1700s the brilliant French (?) imposter and pseudo-lexicographer “George Psalmanazar” (c. 1679–1763) charmed London as a Formosan abducted by Jesuits; for decades he was intimate with notable people such as Samuel Johnson.

302.33 Peace and good will] Cf. Luke 2:14.

304.22 kings in Forty-eight] The Year of Revolution, 1848, saw a wave of republican revolts against European monarchies. Melville wrote the revolutions in Europe into Mardi and the next year, in 1849, briefly saw Paris for himself.

305.27 “Fair Circe . . . the sty!”] Circe, enchantress or sorceress in Greek mythology. In Homer’s Odyssey, Circe turns Odysseus’s men into swine.

309.4 came Jesus from Jerusalem] To the house of Lazarus and his sisters Mary and Martha in Bethany, two miles from the city (Luke 10:38–42 and John 11).

309.36 Ibrahim’s time] Ibrahim Pasha (1789–1848), viceroy of Egypt and head of the Egyptian military and civil administration of Syria, Palestine, and Lebanon, who delivered several defeats to the Ottoman army.

311.4–5 Palmyrene . . . Tadmore’s tented scene] In Melville’s time, Palmyra (also called Tadmore), once a great city, was an oasis northeast of Damascus.

311.8 yataghan] Short Ottoman knife with a double-curved blade and no guard.

312.24 Prolific sire.] Solomon had “seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines” (1 Kings 11:4), number of children unspecified.

314.7 Acheron] One of the rivers of the Greek underworld.

316.5 Levite . . . priest.”] Demanded to define “neighbor,” Jesus tells of a priest and a Levite who looked away from a naked half-dead victim of thieves (Luke 10:31–32). Thus ignored by his countrymen, a Samaritan rescues him and cares for him (verses 33–35), thereby demonstrating what it is to be a neighbor.

319.37 Paul’s courtesy] At the end of an epistle Paul would wish peace and grace.

320.36–39 Paul . . . name and shrine?] Acts 28:11 does not specify that Paul ripped away evidence the ship had been named for patrons of sailors, twin sons of Zeus (Castor and Pollux).

321.36 stone after stone] The message of John the Baptist (John 1:23), taken literally.

322.8 “All things are possible] Jesus’s words (Matthew 19:26).

323.28–29 Darwin quotes . . . Shelley] In The Voyage of the Beagle (1839), chapter 8, thinking how long a plain (in Patagonia) had remained as it was, Darwin quotes Shelley’s “Mont Blanc” (“all seems eternal now”).

325.10 Erebus] Darkness in the underworld on the way to Hades.

326.10 cigarette, a summer friend] Because it goes out faster than a cigar if not sucked on; Thomas Paine in The Crisis (1776) dismisses the “summer soldier” and “sunshine patriot.”

327.3 Abel’s hound] In Genesis Abel has no dog.

327.14 forth from Seir] In 2 Chronicles 2:15, the battle against the people of Seir was not Jehoshaphat’s to fight “but God’s.”

328.1 St. Louis!] King Louis IX of France, who died of disease on the eighth Crusade in Carthage (present-day Tunisia).

328.20 Hecla] Active volcano in Iceland; Melville jokes about its coolness in Moby-Dick, chapter 3.

329.36 Giaour] A non-Muslim—an infidel.

331.24 doomed Pentapolis] The Torah names Admah, Zeboim, and Bela as doomed cities along with Sodom and Gomorrah but Genesis 19:24–25 does not name Bela.

332.8–23 read the Book . . . Yea, verily.”] Achon’s sins and the cost of disobedience to God are told in Joshua 7. When Joshua sent 3,000 men against Ai not knowing that Achan, Carmi’s wicked son, had stolen treasures in Jericho, thirty-six of his men were killed. Joshua ordered Achan and his family and animals stoned and burned in the valley of Achor (trouble), then slaughtered 12,000 men and women of Ai.

333.36–37 Balboa’s ken . . . from Darien] Melville is mindful of Keats’s sonnet on reading Chapman’s Homer, where Cortez stares at the Pacific from Darien.

336.7–9 reed . . . In wilderness?] See Luke 7:24, the ironical first challenge of Jesus’s powerful tribute to John the Baptist: “What went ye out into the wilderness for to see? A reed shaken with the wind?”

336.17–18 Me too . . . snubbed kin;”] In John 13:4–17 Jesus demonstrates that the master is not greater than the servant.

338.14–15 hair-clad John . . . Volney!”] John the Baptist, who wore camel’s hair cloth (Matthew 3:4, Mark 1:6); the French philosopher Chasseboeuf de Volney (1757–1820), who believed all religions could be reconciled, published Travels through Egypt and Syria in 1787.

338.19 Chateaubriand] The Vicomte de Chateaubriand (1768–1848), a Catholic Royalist, visited the Mediterranean in 1806–1807, then wrote The Martyrs (1809), about the Roman persecution of early Christians at the end of the third century.

338.23 Red Caps] French Revolutionists who wore the Phrygian (or Liberty) cap.

338.25 Septemberists] Those who massacred thousands of prisoners and Royalists in Paris and other cities, September 2–7, 1792.

338.26 Vitriolists] See note 281.19.

338.28–29 Lamartine . . . latter palmer.] Alphonse de Lamartine (1790–1869) published his belatedly translated A Pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1848, the year he became a founder of the French Second Republic only to prove too moderate and retire.

339.13–15 Knight of the Leopard . . . Diamond of the Desert?”] In Sir Walter Scott’s The Talisman (1825) Sir Kenneth’s battered shield depicts a “couchant leopard”; in his wanderings he is refreshed at a fountain, the “diamond in the desert.”

339.20–26 Tasso’s Armida . . . fancy’s bid] In Torquato Tasso’s Jerusalem Liberated Armida is a sorceress who retards the Crusader Rinaldo.

339.27–28 Rahab . . . Jericho.”] Harlot spared at the destruction of Jericho because she had hidden Joshua’s spies.

339.30 Arethusa under ground] Arethusa, Greek nymph transformed into a river running under the Mediterranean and arising in Sicily, near Syracuse. Melville knew a Christianized version of the story, where waters started in the Holy Land (Moby-Dick, ch. 41).

340.33 But as heaven made me, so am I.”] See Thomas Middleton’s The Widow (1615–16), II.i.15.

341.1 Ashtoreth] Canaanite goddess of the moon.

346.30 Leon’s spoil of Inca plate] A reference to the gold and silver spoils taken by the conquistador Ponce de Léon (1474–1521). As published in 1876 the word was “Spanish,” better than Melville’s later substitution because Incan spoil did not come from Puerto Rico and Cuba—a confusion like Keats’s mixing of Cortez and Balboa.

346.35 Calpe’s gate] Straits of Gibraltar, Mons Calpe being the Roman name for the Rock of Gibraltar.

348.10 Hegelized] Rolfe’s use of G. W. F. Hegel (1770–1831) as an exemplar of the scientific approach seems inexact since his Science of Logic (1816) does not deal with systematic study of the physical world.

349.15–20 From Ur of the Chaldees . . . God as One—alone] Abraham, as the first believer in one God.

350.24 Esau’s hand] Esau was hairy, his twin brother, Jacob, smooth and hairless (Genesis 25:25, 27:11).

350.30–35 Phlegræan fields . . . all things natural] Volcanic landscape west of Naples, mythological site where Jove felled giants.

351.39–352.2 Mambrino’s helmet . . . given rise] Don Quixote perceives a brass basin on the head of a barber (protecting his hat from the sudden rain) as the enchanted helmet of the fictional Moorish king Mambrino.

353.1 Darwin] Erasmus Darwin (1731–1802) formulated a theory of evolution and survival of the strongest.

353.8 “You Pyrrhonist!] Extreme skeptic.

356.20 Horeb’s Moses] Moses on Mount Sinai, where he was given the Ten Commandments.

357.9–10 Aaron’s gemmed vest . . . Genevan cloth] Aaron’s gemmed vest as described in Exodus 28:15–31; severe clothing such as John Calvin’s sumptuary laws enforced in Geneva.

357.25–28 Uriel Acosta . . . A suicide.] Portuguese Jew and freethinking rationalist (1590–1647) who was brought up a Catholic; he took his own life after twice being ostracized by his synagogue and later recanting.

357.28–36 Heine . . . wreath thereon.] Heinrich Heine (1797–1856), German poet from a Jewish family who converted to Christianity; often criticized by his German contemporaries for his frivolity, sensuality, and offensive language. He died in exile in Paris after a long painful illness and is buried in Montmartre. Photographs of the original tomb show the metal rail and wreath.

358.4–13 But see . . . Moses Mendelssohn . . . safe retreat?’”] The German polymath Moses Mendelssohn (1729–1786), in a public letter to the Swiss theologian Johann Lavater in 1769, explained his reasons for remaining a Jew, but he was still badgered to acknowledge himself a Christian. Isaac Leeser’s 1852 translation of Mendelssohn’s Jerusalem, includes this retort: “If it be true that the corner-stones of my house have started from their place, and the building threatens to tumble down; would I do well if I were to remove my chattels from the lower to the upper story for safety? Would I be safer there? Now, Christianity is, as you know, built upon Judaism, and must necessarily tumble into ruins whenever this falls.”

358.18 Neander] David Mendel (1789–1850), a kinsman of Moses Mendelssohn, converted to Christianity, changed his name to “August Neander,” and became an important historian of Christianity.

360.5 mace of Ivanhoe] Not the weapon of Sir Walter Scott’s hero but Margoth’s geologic hammer.

360.25–27 The Jew . . . Balaam on the ass?”] See Numbers 22:21–35. Margoth, not an angel like the one invisible to Balaam (though not to his ass), lets Nehemiah pass.

365.5–14 thy servant . . . Ave maris stella?] The reference is to Chateaubriand, who sings the “Ave maris stella” song in his Travels (1811). See also note 338.19.

365.29 Cecilia] See note 247.15.

365.30 Benignus Muscatel] The friar who gave Rolfe the hymnbook, the name is a play on “blessed wine.”

367.8 chief of sinners.”] Paul’s provocative claim in 1 Timothy 1:15.

369.3 Paul! . . . Festus] In Acts 26, Paul before Festus and King Agrippa tells the story of his conversion on his way to Damascus so powerfully that Agrippa is almost persuaded to become a Christian.

370.9–10 Melancthon! . . . Luther’s mind] German theologian Philip Me­lanchthon (1497–1560), friend and follower of Protestant reformer Martin Luther (1483–1546), who thought Melanchthon’s Augsburg Confession (1530) too conciliatory toward Catholics.

370.16 Red Republic] France.

372.11 Rome’s tomb . . . Abaddon’s cradle.] The death of Catholicism could open Hell, the kingdom of Abaddon (equivalent of the Greek Apollyon). See Revelation 9:11.

372.12–13 Pope . . . Charlemagne’s great fee—] Charlemagne gave much money to Leo III, and his father gave lands around Rome to the Pope.

373.35 our Scot] The Elder, introduced in “The Cavalcade.”

374.3 Hildebrand’s] In Longfellow’s The Golden Legend (1854), which Melville’s brother-in-law John Hoadley read aloud, “Pope Hildebrand,” Gregory VII (c. 1015–1085), is the “Holy Satan.”

374.31 a Bayard knight] Pierre Terrail, Chevalier de Bayard (c. 1473–1524), was a French solider known as le chevalier sans peur et sans reproche (“the knight without fear and beyond reproach”).

375.18 Dorian Myths] Classical Greek myths.

376.17–20 curse of Frederick . . . the philosophers] Frederick the Great (1712–1786), King of Prussia, is alleged to have remarked, “If I wished to punish a province, I would have it governed by philosophers.”

377.19 Vine evangelic, branching out] Cf. John 15:5.

378.21–22 John’s baptistery . . . Pisa’s beauty keep?] John baptized in the River Jordan, in contrast to the great medieval baptistry in Pisa named for him.

380.1–2 unrecorded race . . . Job implies.] Perhaps a strained reading of Job 30:3–7.

380.11 Sydney’s clan] Philip Sydney (1554–1586), English courtier, poet, and soldier (1554–1586), killed fighting Catholics in the Netherlands, buried with great pomp in St. Paul’s in 1587, memorialized by Edmund Spenser in Astrophel.

382.34–383.4 Pluto’s park . . . apple small.] Lines recalling passages in Spenser’s The Faerie Queene, such as “Pluto’s baleful bowers” in 1.5.14.125.

383.24–25 four kings . . . Siddim] The story of the “slaughter of Chedorlaomer” is told in Genesis 14:1–17.

383.33 Milcom and Chemosh] Heathen gods worshipped by the aged Solomon (1 Kings 11:5–7).

384.7–10 valley of the shade . . . even here.”] Cf. Psalms 23:4.

385.34 Maccabees’ Masada] The hilltop fortress built by Jonathan Maccabee in the second century B.C.E., besieged (73–74 C.E.) by Roman troops under Flavius Silva. Rather than surrender, Eleazer persuaded hundreds of Jews to leap to their deaths with their children.

385.39–40 Mariamne’s hate . . . accelerate.] Called Herodias in Mark 6, the mother of Salomé asked for the head of John the Baptist.

389.8–9 new Jason . . . Burckhardt] In Greek mythology, Jason made an arduous voyage to Colchis to seize the Golden Fleece; for Burckhardt, see note 278.15–17.

390.19 Puck’s platform . . . El Deir.] Rolfe’s term for the ruins of a theater in Petra, from which is visible El Dier (“the monastery,” so miscalled), a magnificent structure carved out of rock.

390.23 the Edomite!”] Esau (Genesis 32:3).

390.25 Sinbad’s pleasant] In early reviews of his books, Melville had been linked as an adventurer with Sinbad of the Arabian Nights, who makes seven fantastic voyages in which he encounters fearful creatures but survives, with riches.

390.26 Pæstum and Petra] A contrast of ancient ruins. Tourists can make pleasant day trips to the ruins of temples in the Greek city in Italy on the Tyrrhenian Sea but, as Derwent says, the travelers in Clarel must leave the all but inaccessible Petra “unseen.”

392.35 Orion’s sword] Constellation named for the giant hunter in Greek mythology, visible in both hemispheres, unlike the “Slanting Cross,” visible only in the Southern Hemisphere.

396.12 St. Francis] St. Francis of Sales (1567–1622), not the more famous Francis of Assisi.

399.21 no mere Pam] The jack of clubs, traditionally the lowest face or “court” card.

400.2–3 race of thought . . . golden sun.] Cf. Dryden’s “Sigismonda and Guiscardo” (1699), lines 337–38: “But ’tis too late, my glorious race is run, / And a dark cloud o’ertakes my setting sun.”

401.7–8 “Mad John,” . . . Vox Clamans] Matthew 3:3 applies Isaiah’s prophecy to John the Baptist crying in the wilderness, “Prepare ye the way of the Lord.”

402.25 “mystery of iniquity:”] Thessalonians 2:7.

403.15 Cities Five] See note 331.24.

403.27–29 the star . . . makes gall;”] In Revelation 8:10–11, the great flaming star Wormwood falls from heaven on a third part of the rivers and on fountains, so that men die of the bitter waters.

404.33 Burker of kind heart] Killer of those with kind hearts, from the Irish-born William Burke (1792–1829), serial murderer, who sold bodies to Robert Knox, an anatomy lecturer at the University of Edinburgh.

405.23 Jael . . . Leah] Jael, who kills King Sisera by driving a nail into his temple (Judges 4:21), and Leah, whose father Laban tricked his nephew Jacob by substituting Leah for her sister Rachel, the one Jacob thought he had just married (Genesis 29:21–28).

406.9 Zoima] Something like “Life” or “Life-force.”

406.22 And still] “Then”—if you credit the wizard, then you can still see the destroyed cities through the waves.

406.23 Franks . . . doubts debar] Westerners, being skeptical of traditions, and folklore, cannot see the overthrown cities.

406.25–27 Seboym and Segor, Aldemah . . . widely reign.] Melville names the three less famous of the five doomed cities of the plain; Sodom and Gomorrah do not need naming. See also note 331.24.

407.14 Armida] See note 339.20–26.

408.11 Dismas the Good Thief] Crucified malefactor who rebuked the mocking malefactor on the other side of Jesus, who promised Dismas would be with him that day in paradise. See Luke 23:40–43 (Luke does not name the man).

408.24 Simon Magus] Acts 8:9–24 tells of the Samarian Sorcerer who, witnessing Peter and John laying hands on believers, thereby giving them the Holy Spirit, foolishly offered them money for the power to pass on the Holy Spirit himself.

412.7–8 “Resurget” . . . “In pace”] Will rise again. Vine adds, “in peace.”

413.3 reminded of the psalm] See note 384.7–10.

Part Three: Mar Saba

415.4–27 What reveries . . . sinless pain?] These lines are “exhalings” (416.1) from the heart of “one” of the pilgrims after Nehemiah’s death—perhaps Rolfe.

415.18–19 St. Teresa . . . Leopardi, Obermann] St. Teresa, Spanish Catholic mystic (1515–1582); and two melancholy depressives and religious skeptics, the Italian poet Count Giacomo Leopardi (1798–1837) and Obermann, a character in a book by Etienne Senancour (1770–1846), known to Melville by two poems of Matthew Arnold’s. The question is, are earnest seekers like Leopardi and Obermann denied the balm shed by the angels on Teresa?

418.12 Nimrod . . . Boone;] Nimrod (Genesis 10:9) was “a mighty hunter before the Lord”; Daniel Boone (1734–1820), the American frontiersman.

418.30–31 Abraham looked again . . . the plain.] Genesis 19:27–28.

419.4–5 from Teman . . . Paran] City and mountain, respectively, to the east of Israel (cf. Habakkuk 3:3).

419.16 the red year Forty-Eight] 1848, when revolutions broke out in Sicily, France, Austria, and Prussia. See also note 304.22.

419.29 striding God of Habakkuk.”] In Habakkuk 3, God comes from the east with indescribable power.

422.1 MANY MANSIONS] Jesus promises that in his Father’s house are many apartments, sections of buildings, not luxurious dwellings (John 14:2).

422.6 heavy laden . . . to me.] Jesus says, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).

422.24 Sermon on the Mount] Matthew 5–7.

422.26 Or bounds are hers . . . Python] Or, does love have bounds?; Python, pagan negation (see also note 92.11–12).

422.29 Circe’s fooling spell] Such as the one with which this goddess of magic retarded Odysseus’s return to Ithaca after the Trojan War.

423.12–13 club and lyceum . . . Goethe] Like superficial popular lecturers, the great German poet and statesman Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) would prefer not to think of religion as fantasized by suffering humankind.

423.16 As some account.] “Some” would include Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

423.25 Job’s pale group] As at Job 2:12–13.

423.29–424.14 “Noble gods . . . the prime!”] The title of the poem is given at 425.24, “The Hymn of Aristippus.” The Greek philosopher Aristippus (c. 435–c. 356 B.C.E.) advocated the pursuit of pleasure. Melville preserved this poem in manuscript.

424.24 what Delian?”] Here, a member of the Delian League in the fifth century B.C.E., which liberated some Greek cities from Persian control.

424.30–33 Orpheus . . . mead] Greek singer who charmed Hades and Per­sephone and might have rescued his dead wife from the underworld had he not looked back for her too soon.

428.2–15 Where silence . . . the ray.] From Arthur Penrhyn Stanley’s Sinai and Palestine (1857). Melville takes his description of this annual phenomenon in the monastery (said to be at the site where God spoke to Moses from a Burning Bush).

428.37 Ormuzd . . . Ahriman] In Zoroastrianism the gods of good and evil.

429.3 Gnostic pages] Ancient Christian heretical texts, especially of the second century C.E., often described as radically dualistic and world-denying, which promoted salvation through esoteric knowledge and mystical spirituality.

429.31–33 Galileo pale . . . sackcloth] For his writings on the Copernican model Italian mathematician and astronomer Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) was tried before the Inquisition, found guilty of heresy, and made to recant.

430.6 seas retiring] See note 224.15.

430.12–13 Saint Denis . . . sire and son] The basilica in Paris where the Capet kings were entombed.

432.34–35 He tossed . . . shadow there;] See “Shelley’s Vision” on pp. 718–19 where pelting one’s shadow is a gesture of self-contempt. Hawthorne pelts his shadow in the early “Foot-prints on the Sea-Shore,” collected in the 1842 Twice-Told Tales (which he gave Melville).

434.26–27 cheerful Paul . . . Rejoice ye evermore.”] In his 1869 essays in Cornhill, Matthew Arnold emphasized the sweet reasonableness of Paul and of Jesus. Cf. 1 Thessalonians 5:16: “Rejoice evermore.”

436.15–16 Magi tincture . . . the Captivity] The Magi were Persians absorbed during the Jewish captivity in Babylon.

436.17 Hillel’s fair reforming school] School of Jewish law founded by Hillel the Elder that flourished in the first century B.C.E. and the beginning of the first century C.E.

436.25–29 the Essene . . . from Galilee.] The Essene, a first century B.C.E. Jewish sect that established communal groups in the desert, rejecting the corruption of Jerusalem, precursors of John the Baptist and Jesus.

436.40–437.1 Shaftesbury . . . Christ’s moan.”] The 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury (1671–1713) rejected miracles and championed morality separate from religious dogma.

437.9–11 Ceres’ child . . . Pluto] Pluto dragged Ceres’s daughter down to the underworld (through Mount Etna in Sicily) but could keep her only the darker half of the year.

437.33 “ELOI LAMA SABACHTHANI!”] Jesus’s words on the cross: “My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (cf. Matthew 27:46).

438.11 David in Adullum’s lair] While Saul was threatening his life, David made Adullum’s cave a stronghold, taking command of some 400 men (1 Samuel 22:1).

438.15 the Cenci portrait] Shelley’s tragedy of incest, The Cenci (1819), as well as Guido Reni’s portrait of Beatrice Cenci (c. 1600) in the Barberini Palace, fascinated both Hawthorne and Melville.

440.25 Apollyon] In Revelation 9:11, the angel of the bottomless pit; Abaddon in Hebrew, Apollyon in Greek.

442.4 Theocritus] The founder of Greek bucolic poetry. See also note 243.25–26

442.19–21 tents of Kedar . . . scarce comely] Cf. Song of Solomon 1:5.

445.15 Grand Chartreuse] Monastery of the Carthusian order, in the Chartreuse Mountains, near Grenoble. Melville knew Matthew Arnold’s “Stanzas from the Grand Chartreuse.”

445.20 St Bruno] Bruno of Cologne (c. 1030–1101), German founder of the Carthusian order of monks and nuns.

450.15 An Arnaut] An inhabitant of Albania, especially one serving in the Turkish army.

450.21 Scanderbeg’s Albanian brood] Gjergj Kastrioti Sanderbeg (1405–1468), also spelled Skanderbig, who called himself “Lord of Albania,” held back Ottoman Muslim encroachments on Europe.

450.22 Arslan] Alp-Arslan (1029–1072), Turkish sultan who conquered Georgia, Armenia, and much of Asia Minor.

450.29 Labarum] Battle flag.

453.16 “At Cana] Where Jesus performed the first of his miracles, turning water into wine (John 2:1–11).

454.14 armed Og] Amorite King of Bashan, one of the last of the race of giants (Deuteronomy 3:11).

455.19 the Tishbite] That is, Elijah (1 Kings 17:1).

458.15 “Since you entreat of me] What follows, The Timoneer’s Story, is also the subject of Melville’s “The Admiral of the White” (pp. 865–66).

462.30 sail latteen] A fore-and-aft triangular sail dating back to Roman times.

463.4 Chang and Eng] Chang and Eng Bunker (1811–1874), Chinese-American conjoined twins born in Siam and exhibited by P. T. Barnum, who later settled in Traphill, North Carolina, married to sisters.

463.21 Hafiz] Fourteenth-century Persian poet appreciated by Melville.

463.22 Didymus] Another name for the Apostle “Doubting” Thomas.

464.16 Methodius] The Apostles’ chaplain is named after Methodius of Olympus (died 311 C.E.), who rejected a sexual meaning of Song of Solomon, as Bernard did (see note 620.33–36).

465.12 Euroclydon] Tempestuous northeast wind, here the “sea-appareled Greek” (463.32).

465.21–24 Dilston Hall . . . take his name.] James Radcliffe (1689–1716), the 3rd Earl of Derwentwater, was beheaded by George I as a Jacobite rebel, the execution coinciding with especially brilliant Northern Lights at his Dilston Hall, in Northumberland.

466.8 amaranths] The amaranth plant is defined in Pierre as “immortal” and as “the ever-encroaching appetite for God.”

466.37 The Anak . . . Mahone] The Arnaut, a giant of a man, like Anak, whose sons make other men appear “as grasshoppers” (Numbers 13:33); Mahone, an archaism for Mohammed.

469.20 Mumbling] Gnawing.

469.25 Brinvilliers’ hand] From the Marquise de Brinvilliers (1630–1676), beheaded and burned as a serial poisoner.

471.5–14 Lady Esther . . . came not.] Hester Stanhope (1776–1839), niece of William Pitt the Younger, set herself up in an abandoned monastery near Sidon, where she sheltered many Druze and became increasingly fanatical, “the crazy Queen of Lebanon,” as Whittier called her in “Snow-Bound” (1866).

472.9 THE EASTER FIRE] Melville never saw the celebration of Greek Easter at Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulcher; the depictions that follow draw from John Lloyd Stephens’s Incidents of Travel in Egypt, Arabia Petræa, and the Holy Land (1837) and Robert Curzon’s A Visit to Monasteries in the Levant (1849).

473.2 El Cods] “The Holy,” which some Muslims applied to Jerusalem.

473.39 Atys’ scath] Scathe, harm. Atys or Attis was the consort of the goddess Cybele, who drove him into a frenzy in which he castrated himself; followers in his cult also were castrated.

474.4 No: Dindymus’ nor Brahma’s crew] “No” because what happens at Easter in Jerusalem is worse than the stories of Atys. Neither Greek self-castrators at Mount Dindymus nor Indian religious fanatics had been wrought to such murderous and suicidal extreme as the Christian worshippers just described.

477.16 Moses and Comte, Renan and Paul] Two pairs of opposites. Moses talked directly to God, and Auguste Comte (1798–1857) rejected the supernatural; Ernest Renan (1823–1892) in his Saint Paul (1869) wrote as a historical scholar who surmised that the Christ who Paul thought gave him personal revelations was his own phantom.

478.5 slain Patroclus.] The seventh book of the Iliad describes Achilles’s supervising the temporary funeral mound of Patroclus amid intense sporting events, including great chariot races.

478.14–18 Ibrahim the conqueror . . . heaven’s light.] Ibrahim Pasha (1789–1848), Egyptian general who in 1833 gained Syria for Egypt. In attempting to escape the frenzy at an Easter Fire, Ibrahim fainted, while many worshippers were suffocated or crushed to death.

478.20–23 would but sustain . . . Let it stand.’] Ibrahim told Robert Curzon that the “interference of a Mahometan” in the bloody sham of the Holy Fire “would only have been held as another persecution of the Christians,” so he would not forbid it.

479.32 Jeremiah’s in dungeon cast] Jeremiah 38 describes the imprisonment of the prophet.

480.7 Taken and blinded] The king of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, blinded King Zedekiah (Jeremiah 39:7).

482.21 Urim and Thummim] Parts of Aaron’s breastplate as high priest, fitting over the heart (Exodus 28:30).

482.27 Septuagint] Earliest Greek translation from the Hebrew of Old Testament books, some now classed in the Apocrypha.

483.28 Cartaphilus] Name given to the Wandering Jew of medieval legend who mocked Jesus on his way to the cross and was condemned to roam the earth until His return.

487.16 “Absalom’s Pillar!] So named by Absalom because he had no son to keep his name in remembrance (2 Samuel 18:18).

488.1 “Bismillah!”] “In the name of God,” the opening of the Quran.

488.3 “Dies iræ, dies illa!”] Day of wrath, day of doom.

489.9 Islesman] The man from Lesbos.

491.33 Duns Scotus] Venerated medieval Scottish theologian John Duns (1266–1308).

493.23 “Pilots retained?] That is, ministers acting as retained attorneys for sects, as in Emerson’s “Self-Reliance.”

500.16 Lazarus] Raised by Jesus after being dead four days, Lazarus comes forth from the tomb “bound hand and foot with grave-clothes, and his face was bound about with a napkin” (John 11:44).

508.30 dibble] A tool for poking in the ground when planting.

509.26 Lachryma Christi] Wine from near the bay of Naples, but also “Christ’s tears.”

511.20 Achmed] Melville may have meant not Achmed but Ahmed (1590–1617), whose father had executed nineteen of his own brothers and half brothers.

512.31 Plumb down from horror’s battlement] Poesque line.

514.30 Sabaïtes’ bones] Skulls of those in Mar Saba killed by Persian invaders in 615 C.E.

520.29 thou Paraclete] The Holy Spirit.

522.2 Bandusia fount] Stream of crystal water celebrated by Horace, in the news because of Lord Lytton’s 1869 translation.

522.11 Mendanna’s sea] The Spanish navigator Alvaro Mendaña de Neira (1542–1595) discovered the Solomon Islands and, more important for Melville, the Marquesas.

524.40 colonades where Enoch roves] “Enoch walked with God” (Genesis 5:22); since “God took him” (Genesis 5:24), perhaps the colonnades are in heaven.

525.8 Fomalhaut] In the Northern Hemisphere, a low bright star (brightest in autumn) with no other bright star near.

526.3 Decius’s cruel age] The Roman emperor Decius around 250 C.E. killed many Christians for not sacrificing to Roman gods.

526.4 Christian of Thebæan clime] Celibate Christian in Egypt, at modern Luxor.

526.5 David’s son . . . he of Dan] Probably Amnon (David’s son), who raped his half sister Tamar and was killed by Absalom and his friends. Dan is the place in the north of Israel where Dan the son of Jacob lived. “He” of Dan, a descendant, is Samson, who was betrayed by Delilah and blinded (Judges 14–16).

526.6 him misloved . . . bride] Most likely Joseph, who flees the persistent advances of Pharaoh’s wife (Genesis 39:7–20), although she is not described as a new wife, a bride.

526.7 Job whose . . . his ban] Job’s wife’s mockery is described in Job 2:9. Her advice to the afflicted Job: “curse God, and die.” These four stories (526.5–7) deal with men who suffer death, imprisonment, loss of possessions, family, and physical damage (being blinded, being covered with boils), all caused or exacerbated by women. The innocent Tamar would be blamed for occasioning the rape, both of Samson’s wives blamed for betraying him and of Pharaoh’s wife for enticing him. Clarel later remembers the stories of the celibate almoner as the “bodeful text of hermit-rhyme!” (632.12).

527.9 Passing the love of woman] After Jonathan’s death David laments, “thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women” (2 Samuel 1:26).

529.4 eremite’s Thebæan flame] During the persecution by Decius in the third century C.E., when the celibate’s vellum book was written, Paul of Thebes is said to have become the first celibate monk, living many decades in a cave in the Egyptian desert.

Part Four: Bethlehem

550.30 Varus’ legions mossy grown?] In 9 C.E. the Roman general Varus lost some 20,000 soldiers and many civilians in a Germanic ambush in the Teutoburg Forest in present-day Lower Saxony.

551.22 Sad arch between contrasted eras] The winter of 1860–61, while Southern states were seceding (often misapplied to the whole Civil War).

551.30 A paper pact] The U.S. Constitution.

552.2 as the fable goes] In Plato’s Republic (Book 10), Socrates’s fable of Er from Pamphylia, on the southern coast of Asia Minor.

552.19 ship Ark . . . attendant Dove.] Ships hired in 1634 by Cecil Calvert (Lord Baltimore) to carry Catholics to North America, the founders of Maryland.

552.34 Tilly’s great command] Johann Tserclaes (1559–1632), Count of Tilly, now in Belgium, led Catholics to victories in the Thirty Years’ War.

555.24 spikenard] Extremely expensive ointment with which Mary, the sister of Lazarus and Martha, anoints the feet of Jesus (John 12:3).

556.22 the girt Capuchin] Franciscan sect in control of the monastery at Bethlehem.

558.32–559.2 Sylvanus . . . Pan is dead!] Sylvanus, Roman god of the woods. In Milton’s fantasy poem “On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity” pagan forces are overcome and oracles are silent. Plutarch in “The Obsolescence of Oracles” has a divine voice calling to a sailor at sea, asking him to spread the news that the Greek god Pan (associated with Sylvanus) is dead; later a Christian interpretation linked this cessation of the oracles to the birth of Jesus.

559.4 From man’s deep nature are they rolled] Emerson’s “The Problem”: “Never from lips of cunning fell / The Thrilling Delphic oracle; / Out from the heart of nature rolled / The burdens of the Bible old.”

560.32 Terrene with heavenly to compare] Melville pays homage to other poets: Virgil in “Eclogues” compares great things with small, and Milton in Paradise Lost compares great things with small and illuminates small things by great (Paradise Regained).

560.40 shekinah] Glory, dazzling presence of God.

561.2–3 St. John boy . . . belt of tow] Like a young John the Baptist, in camel hair with a girdle of skin about his loins.

561.21–34 Lot and Abraham . . . both were wise.] Genesis 13:8–9, 11.

562.30 Let the horse answer] In his rounds as a custom officer on Manhattan, Melville regularly witnessed extreme brutality to horses.

563.9 Hughs of Lincoln] Medieval calumny against Jews (the supposed murder of a Christian boy named Hugh) that led to horrors such as the massacre of 150 Jews in Clifford’s Tower in York in 1190.

566.40–567.1 Louis plied . . . upon himself.] King Louis IX (1214–1270) scourged himself and wore a hair shirt. See also note 328.1.

568.35 Land named of Behest] “The Promised Land” (with behest in the archaic meaning of promise).

571.21 Dismembered Poland . . . Ninety-Five] The Partition of 1795, dividing Poland among Prussia, Russia, and Austria.

571.39 Poland’s place in Thirty-One] Not another partition but the absorption of Poland in 1831 into Russia.

572.28 Ormus] In Paradise Lost, II.1–2, Satan’s throne outshines even the fabulous wealth of Ormus.

573.20 slender monk and young] A description closely drawn from John Lloyd Stephens’s 1837 Incidents of Travel.

574.7 Isaac . . . too young to know?] Too young to know that he might be sacrificed in the desert, as Abraham almost did with Isaac (Genesis 22:10).

575.2–7 Baldwin . . . Godfrey’s requiem . . . King of Jerusalem] See note 174.7.

575.37 Archimago’s cave] In The Faerie Queene, this deceitful sorcerer has a hermitage, not a cave.

580.31 Ignatius] St. Ignatius of Loyola (1491–1556), founder of the Jesuits.

580.32 Martin] St. Martin of Tours (316–397), who left the Roman army after becoming a Christian; father of monasticism in Gaul.

581.3–7 Angelo Tancredi . . . the cavalier] Melville could have found Tancredi’s momentous encounter with St. Francis in recent editions of The Life of Saint Francis of Assisi.

583.22–35 How like a Poor Clare in her cheer . . . passion-flower.] “Cheer” in this context means countenance. In appearance like a Poor Clare, nun of the second oldest Franciscan order (1212). Nature appears dull until the Cordelier (Franciscan) in a Mexican glade perceives emblems of Jesus’s crucifixion in what he names the passionflower (passiflora).

585.14–17 Paula kneeled . . . renowned Jerome.] Paula, noble Roman who as a wealthy widow in 382 met St. Jerome; in Bethlehem they built a monastery and a convent. Jerome (c. 347–420), of Illyrian origin, studied in Rome, then went to Syria and later the Holy Land. A historian and theologian, he translated parts of the Bible into Latin from Greek and even Hebrew (then neglected as a source).

590.17 Saadi’s wit] The wit of Saadi of Shiraz, the thirteenth-century Persian poet.

590.25–33 “Flamen . . . Mythra . . . the sun!”] Flamen, a priest; Mythra, the divinity of light, now extinguished. Skepticism having banished gods, Catholicism (and all Christianity) is dying away like the Persian religions.

592.30–31 Ethan Allen . . . Herbert lord of Cherbury] Allen (1738–1789), Connecticut-born Vermonter, captured Fort Ticonderoga from the British and later wrote a treatise on Deism. The “Titanic Vermonter” is exalted in Israel Potter as embodying a “peculiar Americanism,” “the western spirit.” Edward Herbert (1582–1648), soldier on the Continent and author of a Deistic book, On Truth.

593.9–16 legendary grot . . . droppings of Madonna’s breasts . . . Oberon.] The legendary grotto is the Milk Grotto, where Mary is said to have nursed Jesus. When milk from her breasts fell on the floor, the grotto turned white. John Lloyd Stephens in Incidents of Travel says “her milk overflowed.” Like other, similar fantasies about fauns, cherubs, genii, and Oberon, the legend of the Milk Grotto is born of “creative love.”

595.10–16 Of yore . . . sacred one.”] Hellenic (and Christian) happy frauds, not current archaeological discoveries.

596.36 owns] Acknowledges.

596.36–597.7 the lives . . . sinners start.”] People’s actual “lives” have not changed because of Buddha’s teachings, or Confucius’s, or Moses’s Ten Commandments. Only threat of punishment (penalty) inhibits sinners.

600.37 This great Diana of ill fame!] Democracy.

602.40 Aurelius Antonine] Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121–180 C.E.), Roman emperor and author of Meditations (on Stoic philosophy).

612.34–35 Lincoln Hugh . . . Mammon] See note 563.9.

615.36 grove of Daphne] In northern Syria near Antioch, a grove to Apollo, where excessive indulgence prevailed.

618.9 Jephthah’s daughter] After winning great battles for Israel, Jephthah promises to sacrifice the first thing that comes out of his door to meet him on his triumphal return. It is his daughter, who accepts her fate and is sacrificed (Judges 11:29–40).

619.5 malison] Malediction, curse. Isaiah’s prophecy of the destruction of Damascus (Isaiah 7:8, 8:4, 17:1).

619.9–24 Abana and Pharpar’s streams . . . . . . healed him.”] The leper Naaman foolishly says that “Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus,” are greater than the waters of Israel, but it is the waters of the River Jordan that cure him (2 Kings 5:1–14).

620.17 spies from Eshcol] In Numbers 13 Moses’s spies return with the report that the land of Canaan flowed with milk and honey but that the inhabitants were men of great stature, descendants of the giant Anak.

620.33–36 Solomon’s Song . . . Saint Bernard] Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153), Benedictine monk, preached sermons proving that the Song of Solomon was a religious allegory (not sexual).

621.8 Bonzes Hafiz’ rhyme construe] The Bonzes (Buddhist monks) misconstrue Hafiz as religious, not sensual.

624.1 Betwixt a Shushan and a sand] Between the gay young Lyonese and the Franciscan Salvaterra, between eroticism and asceticism.

627.20 Jesse’s son] David.

627.21 Adullam’s lair] See note 438.11.

632.12 bodeful text of hermit-rhyme!] See note 526.7.

632.24–25 keep far from me . . . Manes and the Manichee!] Clarel rejects the Persian Manes (215–275 C.E.), founder of Manichaeism, for his insistence upon abstinence in most food, drink, wedlock, and any amorous relations.

634.11–13 Coquimbo’s ground . . . the shock.] Coquimbo, port in Chile; news of an earthquake there reached New York in February 1850, just after Melville’s return from England.

641.20 Stabat] Latin hymn about Mary’s suffering during her son’s crucifixion.

641.21 Tenebræ] The extinguishing of candles in the days before Easter.

641.21–29 when the day . . . anthem of the spring.] In a year when Catholics and all other Christians celebrate Easter on the same day.

642.35–36 Thammuz’s spring . . . Joel’s glade?] A pagan god may console through seasonal rebirth but to the Hebrew prophet good cheer can be a mockery: “The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered: because joy is withered away from the sons of men” (Joel 1:12).

JOHN MARR AND OTHER SAILORS WITH SOME SEA-PIECES

664.24 Uzzite’s black shard] See Job 1:1 (Job “was a man in the land of Uz”) and Job 2:8, where he scrapes his sore boils with a potsherd—pot-shard.

666.36 Xeres] Jerez, in Spain.

667.3 Pecksniff] The greedy architect in Dickens’s Martin Chuzzlewit (1842–44).

668.22 King Og] A giant (Deuteronomy 3:11).

669.32 Anak] Also a giant, as in Numbers 13:33.

672.9 Bon Homme Dick] The Bonhomme Richard, Continental warship placed under John Paul Jones in 1779 and renamed in honor of Benjamin Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanac.

673.17 Bohea] Popular black Chinese tea (pronounced Boo-Hee).

674.17 Sargasso] Seaweed, in the North Atlantic region known as the Sargasso Sea.

674.19 Flying-Dutchman] The ghost ship that can never make port.

674.31 shank-painters] Short ropes or chains holding anchors to the sides of a ship.

677.15–17 By open ports . . . Plate Fleet] Portholes; plate means silver, and the Plate Fleet consists of several ships bound for England (including captured Spanish galleons manned by British crews). The English flagship carries treasure Spanish soldiers have seized in Central and South America. Historical battles like Admiral Robert Blake’s 1657 triumph over a Spanish Plate Fleet at Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the Canary Islands lie behind this poem.

677.20 the red-cross Flag of the White.] The flagship of the fleet.

678.12 Opher] Ophir, in India, the source of gold lavished upon Solomon by the Queen of Sheba (1 Kings 10).

679.14 quaking Lima’s crosses rock] In one of the Peruvian earthquakes.

680.19–20 sensitive needle . . . disturbed] The Spanish armor stowed below changes the needle of the flagship compass. In his journal at Thessalonica on December 7, 1856, Melville wrote: “Captain told a story about the heap of arms affecting the compass.”

683.28 Oreads] Mountain nymphs, who normally help travelers.

688.22 Gorgonian head] In Greek myth the Gorgon sisters had snakes for hair. In Mardi (ch. 18) the shark’s “Medusa locks” consist of remoras attached to its back.

TIMOLEON ETC.

699.1 Timoleon] Recalled by the Corinthians after exile for his participation in killing his brother, Timoleon (411–337 B.C.E.) in Sicily fought off forces from Carthage and ruled the island benevolently.

699.29–700.7 Argos and Cleone . . . his shield] In his Lives, Plutarch describes the battle between the Corinthians and the troops of Argos and Cleone, and how Timoleon saved his older brother Timophanes by covering him with his shield.

701.29–31 lictors . . . Furies’ rods.] The bodyguards carried fasces, bundles of rods.

701.33 Ate] Goddess of mischief, who causes ruinous decisions and actions.

703.6 Phocion] An honorable Athenaeum politician.

706.1–2 ’Tis Vesta . . . delirious leap] Vesta is the Roman goddess of domesticity; Sappho, the poet of female homosexuality, was claimed (by men wishing to make her heterosexual) to have leaped from a cliff for love of a young ferryman.

708.21 Albani’s porch] Villa Albani, grand mid-eighteenth-century villa near Rome pillaged during Napoleon’s invasion (visited by Melville).

708.24 Thomas a’Kempis] German-Dutch monk and theologian (1380–1471), author of the Imitation of Christ.

709.1 arm’d Virgin] Athena, goddess who burst from Zeus’s head already helmeted and with a sphere.

716.16–17 “Though He . . . trust in Him.”] Job 13:15.

717.3 burning boats in Caesar’s rear] Plutarch says that Caesar was forced to burn his ships at Alexandria to keep them from the enemy.

718.4 C——’s Lament] In a draft of the poem, Melville used the name of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834).

718.25 Shelley’s Vision] In “Foot-prints on the Sea-shore” Hawthorne pelts his shadow in the sea with pebbles, a sign of self-contempt (the opposite of “Self-reverence”). See Clarel 432.34–35.

720.3 The Age of Antonines] Roman emperors, especially Antoninus Pius (reigned 138–161 C.E.) and Marcus Aurelius (reigned 161–180 C.E.).

720.13 Solstice of Man] Period of becalmed seas, a week before and after the winter solstice when, it was believed, kingfishers laid their eggs on floating nests.

721.27 Truce of God] In the eleventh and twelfth centuries the Catholic Church declared various truces during which warfare would be suspended.

721.28 Calumet] Peace pipe.

722.2 Raleigh’s find] Sir Walter Raleigh (1554?–1618), a promoter of Virginia settlement, did much to popularize tobacco in England.

722.4 Gilead’s] “Is there no balm in Gilead?” (Jeremiah 8:22).

722.15 Saint Martin’s summer] Indian summer.

723.21 Jael the wiled one] See note 78.14.

730.1–3 Spinoza . . . and you!] Spinoza (who never went to Greece) deludedly imagines a unity of the beauteous prostitute and the temple.

730.5 The Frieze] The Parthenon frieze (“Elgin marbles”), probably seen by Melville.

730.20 Ictinus] A designer of the Parthenon.

731.6 Off Cape Colonna] Cape Colonna in Greece, so named for the one remaining column of the temple to Juno. The site of William Falconer’s 1762 poem The Shipwreck.

733.21 Anacreon] Greek lyric poet of drinking songs.

733.34 Phrygian cap] See note 338.23.

733.37 Proserpine’s] Proserpina, vegetative goddess: abducted by Pluto to be Queen of the Underworld, she was allowed to return to earth in spring and summer.

734.13 Hermes] A remarkable statue of a young man holding the infant Dionysus, discovered in May 1877, in the ruins of a Greek temple, to great international excitement.

735.14 Theban flamens] Priests of Thebes, in Egypt, where Luxor is now.

736.6 Grampians] Mountain range in Scotland.

736.21 You—turn the cheek] Jesus’s advice (Matthew 5:39).

738.8 Kaf] See note 53.8.

738.9 Araxes] River running from Turkey into Iran.

WEEDS AND WILDINGS CHIEFLY: WITH A ROSE OR TWO

744.29 “melting mood”] In Othello’s last speech his eyes drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees drop their medicinable gum.

746.14 dibbling] Poking a hole in soil with a pointed tool with a curved handle.

747.19 mouse, and mole] In John Webster’s The White Devil (1612) the “ant, the field mouse and the mole” (V.iv.109) are to rear hillocks to keep a dead body warm.

750.7 spars] Bright crystalline mineral, easily cleaved into facets.

753.30 Oberon’s clan] Oberon, the king of the fairies in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

757.4 Keats, stabbed by the Muses] In his vision the poet hears the goddess reject the common accusation that the critics killed Keats.

759.8–9 American Aloe on Exhibition] Melville’s Van Rensselaer cousins put their “Great American Aloe” on exhibition “in its centennial bloom” in September 1842, while Melville was in the Pacific. “All Albany” was “going to see it,” and New York City papers suggested that “people of floral taste” might go up to Albany to see it with its flower stem “22 feet high” containing “at least 2,000 flowers.” All the proceeds went to “that laudable charity, the Orphan Asylum.”

764.22 betrayed purpose] An echo of “purposes betrayed” in Wordsworth’s “Malham Cove” (1819), a meditation on conceiving a complete work of art versus completing it and versus having it utterly decay after completion.

767.25–27 Benjamin West . . . was Death.’] The American-born painter (1738–1820) took this subject from Revelation 6:8, in 1796 and again in 1817.

769.10 Jefferson] Joseph Jefferson (1829–1905) played the young and the old Rip Van Winkle successfully for four decades, living to be filmed in the role.

769.32 Boniface] Term for an innkeeper, from the character in George Farquhar’s The Beaux’ Stratagem (1707).

771.4 bossom’s lawn] A cloth.

774.3–4 Four words for text . . . The Rose of Sharon] Song of Solomon 2:1. “I am the rose of Sharon.”

774.10 metheglin] Mead, from a mix of fermented honey and water.

775.24 Clement Drouon] Presumably a fictional invention by Melville.

776.28 Shushan] Ancient city in Persia. See Clarel 623.22–624.4.

778.3 Coming through the rye] Title of a 1782 poem (“Comin’ Thro’ the Rye”) by Robert Burns.

778.30–31 Dives . . . Lazarus’] Luke 16:19–31.

779.11–12 laved by streams . . . Pharpar . . . Abana] 2 Kings 5:12. See also note 619.9–24.

782.17 Eve’s fair daughters] Genesis 6:2, 4.

PARTHENOPE

798.30–34 “The ladies . . . to please.”] W. D. Howells: “Our men read the newspapers, but our women read the books.”

802.3 Almanac de Gotha] The dictionary of European nobility and royalty published in Germany from 1763 to 1944.

803.9 Asaph the Singer] One of David’s singers before the Ark (1 Chronicles 15:17 and 16:5).

804.2 Bomba] So called from his brutal bombardment of Messina in 1848, Ferdinand II (1810–1859), King of the Two Sicilies.

804.28 King Fanny, Bomba’s heir] Bomba’s son, Francis II (reigned 1859–61).

804.31 Bullock] So called from his exile on the Pampas of Uruguay, Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807–1882), the general who brought about the unification of Italy.

806.29 Cade] Leader of an English rebellion in 1450 who in Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part II, IV.ii, agrees with the follower who wants to “kill all the lawyers.”

807.22 Arethusa] See note 339.30.

822.6 Cid Campeadór] Eleventh-century Castilian warrior Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, a folk hero for his battles mainly against Moors.

826.34 Ducit amor patriæ!] “Patriotism Leads Me.”

826.35 General Worth’s monument] The monument to William Worth (1794–1849), Mexican-American War hero, is at 5th Avenue, Broadway, and 25th Street, near Melville’s house.

827.17 Charles Fenno Hoffman] New York literary man (1806–1884), institutionalized as insane during the last three decades of his life.

838.28 Thirty Thousand Virgins of Cologne] An inflated allusion to a medieval cult involving a possibly imaginary St. Ursula and virgins violated by the Huns; relics were shown in a church Melville apparently did not visit in Cologne.

839.17 Peri] Fairy in Persian mythology, familiar from Thomas Moore’s Lalla Rookh.

841.19 Silvio] Silvio Pellico (1789–1854), Italian dramatist and patriot, imprisoned for a decade by Austrian rulers, wrote My Prisons (1836), which helped the cause of unification in Italy.

843.33 Rome’s . . . laureat] Virgil.

843.34 England’s now] England’s laureate from 1850 to 1892, Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

847.27 Queen Joanna] Queen Joanna of Naples (1326–1382), who had her husband, Andrew of Hungary, murdered.

850.13 Carmagnole] Brutally exultant song popular during the French Revolution, accompanied by a dance.

853.1 Metheglin] See note 774.10.

UNCOLLECTED POETRY AND PROSE-AND-VERSE

870.9 Osiris] Egyptian god of the afterlife and rebirth.

870.12 Thotmes] Thothmes III, Pharaoh who was a great military leader in the fifteenth century B.C.E.

870.24–27 Here . . . Fat Jack was one] In Henry IV, Part I, II.iv, Falstaff plays Hal’s father, then they switch roles; as the king, Hal promises to banish “plump jack.”

873.8–10 Falernian fellows . . . Hafiz . . . Horace . . . Beranger] Falernian wine was renowned in ancient Rome. All three poets celebrated alcohol.

874.20 Take a reef] Reduce the size of a sail.

875.3 genius, turned to sordid ends] Compare Clarel 247.5–247.9.

875.16 Gold was none for Danæ’s shower] The transcription of the manuscript here is correct but no one has explained Danæ without a shower of gold.

876.10 mattock heavier than the hoe] For grave-digging.

879.6 All smiles at last] Echo of Robert Browning’s “My Last Duchess” (1842).

879.13 even] Level.

879.17 life-thong] Sort of rope that strangles life.

880.23–26 Pish! . . . spotless humans, we!] In the Charles Cotton translation, Montaigne (in “Apology of Raymond Sebond”) asks, “When I play with my cat, who knows if I am not a pastime to her more than she is to me?”

881.7 free robe and vest] That is, free of robe and vest.

881.10 Ancient of Days] In the prophet Daniel’s “dream and visions” four gigantic, diversely shaped, prehistoric beasts come up from the sea and establish their power, only to have their thrones “cast down” as God (“the Ancient of days”) sits, his garment “white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire” (Daniel 7:9).

881.11 Man of the Cave of Engihoul] In 1831, a paleontologist found in a cave in Belgium human bones along with bones from now-extinct animals. In The Geological Evidences of the Antiquity of Man (1863), Sir Charles Lyell discussed whether the bones of man and animals could have been deposited at different epochs. The Appleton editions of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species came out in February 1860 and The Descent of Man in April 1871.

881.17 Not older Cuvier’s mastodon] That is, one hypothesis is that Cuvier’s mastodon was contemporaneous with or younger than the man in the cave.

881.21–23 Thule’s king . . . Wetterhorn] The man of the cave claims to remember when the king of the ultimate northern regions travelled by sleigh (drawn by a possibly extinct breed of reindeer—such as paleontologists were finding?) from the Pole to the top of the lofty Wetterhorn in Switzerland over waters still frozen in May—a flooded continent. The tale of St. Nicholas’s Christmas journey dates only from the popularity of Clement Moore’s poem (commonly known as “The Night Before Christmas”), after the late 1830s.

881.29 do-do tracks] Footmarks of the recently extinct dodo of the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius: the man of Engihoul broods on extinctions dating long before the time of the Greek Chronos (the personification of Time).

882.6 From Moses knocks under the stool.] That is, knocks the stool from under Moses—wiping aside the Hebrew myths and history.

882.7 In bas relief . . . cracked decree!] The man of bone has shown prehistoric creatures in bas relief (as they were being excavated from cave floors), but the greater Barnum show was re-created in the mid-1850s in a Victorian Jurassic Park in Crystal Palace Park, the Megalosaurus and other prehistoric creatures standing or part submerged, full size (to the best of current scientific estimation).

882.19 quiz] Tease, mock.

882.31 Buss me] Kiss me (line spoken by the man of bone).

882.33–34 Joe Smith . . . Joves Three . . . Jos . . . great Mahone] Joseph Smith, Jr. (1805–1844), the founder of Mormonism; the three Joves, Roman deities (as a Victorian translation of Cicero’s The Nature of the Gods says, “Your theologians . . . and authors on unknown antiquity, say that in the universe there are three Joves”); Jos (or Joss), Chinese god worshipped in the form of an idol; Mahone: a slurring way of referring to Mohammet.

883.1 Ducalion’s day] Deucalion, the Greek parallel to Noah.

883.2 Pliocene] The most recent geological epoch of three that Lyell introduces at the outset of his Antiquities.

883.3 Ens] Latin for “entity,” “being,” as in Emerson’s Nature: “Every such truth is the absolute Ens seen from one side. But it has innumerable sides.”

883.10 the Grand Pan-Jam] The Grand Panjandrum, invented in the 1700s in a passage to test an actor’s memory, by Melville’s time applied to spectacular public displays. Here, the whole kit and caboodle of religion, from homegrown American Mormonism to Joss in China and Mohammedanism.

886.27 Artemis] Greek equivalent of Diana, goddess of the hunt.

887.28–30 Sesostris’s . . . Isis . . . Watts] The Pharaoh Sesostris (known in the form of a ruined colossal statue); Isis, Egyptian goddess, believed to help the dead enter the afterlife; James Watt (1736–1819), Scottish inventor whose 1769 steam engine was crucial to the Industrial Revolution.